As the Indian women’s cricket team gears up for the Test
match against England, my mind drifts to early February, to a time when I was
swallowing every bit of information Cricinfo had to offer. I navigated my way
to the Women’s Cricket page and the first article that showed up was titled ‘Indian
women to play Test in England’. My heart raced and I couldn’t believe my eyes.
I quickly opened the article and read it… Not once, not twice, but all of five
times. Each time I read it, the excitement grew. Could it really be? A Test match after eight years? And in England at
that? I must be dreaming! The news just couldn’t get any better.
Turns out I wasn’t dreaming after all, and the Indian women
are scheduled to play a solitary Test match in Wormsley followed by three one
day games at Scarborough. The squad landed in England a couple of
weeks ago. Of the 16, only three have any experience playing Test cricket. All
three though, have played Test cricket in England and tasted success there too.
Captain Mithali Raj, Vice- Captain Karuna Jain, and spearhead Jhulan Goswami
were all part of India’s tour to England in 2006, when they defeated the hosts
1-0 in a two Test series. Goswami terrorized the English girls, taking 10 wickets in the second Test at Taunton. She returns as the
leader of the attack, rejuvenated and ready to scatter the stumps again.
Mithali Raj, too, has some fond memories of Test matches in England. She scored
a double hundred on her first (Test) tour there and has continued to get runs
in those conditions ever since—the recent match against the MCC is proof
enough. Wicket-keeper, Karuna Jain has the advantage of having played all her Test matches against England. She has been
in and around the Indian squad for quite a while now and her immense experience
at the domestic level means she knows her game inside out.
Though none of the others have played a single Test match,
they all have some international experience under their belts. Apart from
Jhulan Goswami, Niranjana Nagarajan, Shubhlakshmi Sharma and Ekta Bisht have
all played in England before. Niranjana, in particular, will have warm memories
of her previous tour to the UK—she picked up 3 wickets at Lord’s, followed by
her career-best figures of 3 for 24 at Truro. The rest of the bowlers, Shikha
Pandey, Poonam Yadav and Rajeshwari Gayakwad, have made promising starts to
their careers and definitely have the ability to step up to the plate when they
are called upon. The bowling unit may not look as strong as the days of Neetu
David, Jhulan Goswami, Nooshin Al Khadeer, Rumeli Dhar, Deepa Marathe and the
others, but they are all capable of delivering the goods.
The batting will depend heavily on the fortunes of the
captain. Poonam Raut, Harmanpreet Kaur and Karuna Jain will provide valuable
experience to the line-up as well. Southpaws Smriti Mandhana and Thirush Kamini
will look to make their mark outside the sub-continent with some meaningful
contributions. VR Vanitha, Swagatika Rath, and Sushma Verma will all be itching
to get into the action and stamp their authority on the English
girls—aggression is their way to go!
(All the batters showed promise in the warm up game against the England Academy squad. They will be looking to carry on from where they left off).
All in all it should be a pretty interesting series. The
last time India toured England, they played bravely, coming close to beating
the hosts. Having led the one day series 2-0, they lost the next 3 and the
series too. Let’s hope this time things turn out differently. I for one can’t
wait for the Test to begin—if only they were telecasting it!
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