A World Cup semi-final, the highest order fails, Jersey quantity 7 spikes hopes of victory, and all the pieces falls aside after they get out; Indian followers noticed the same harrowing sight final night time to what they’d already witnessed on the males’s ODI World Cup in 2019. Indian ladies misplaced to Australia within the first semi-final of the T20 World Cup by 5 runs, and the Indian followers’ lengthy anticipate an ICC trophy continued.
Not the primary time for India
This isn’t the primary time the Indian workforce has choked in a knockout recreation. India has made it into the knockouts about 9 instances earlier than this (10 should you embrace the 2022 Commonwealth Video games) however is but to win an ICC trophy. The primary time India made it into the knockouts was on the 1997 ODI World Cup. India have been to play the semi-final towards the mighty Aussies. It was a 32-over recreation, and Australia, regardless of a low rating of 123, managed to bowl India out for 104, successful the sport by 19 runs. What began there, has continued ever since.
India reached the finals of the ODI World Cup in 2005, 2017, and 2022, however sadly, they misplaced all three finals to Australia, England, and New Zealand respectively. Within the T20 World Cup, India reached the semi-finals in 2009, 2010, and 2018, however they did not progress past that stage. In addition they reached the ultimate of the 2020 Ladies’s T20 World Cup however misplaced to Australia.
Earlier than the 2023 Ladies’s T20 World Cup started, retired captain Mithali Raj had made a press release that the Ladies’s Cricket Staff has now reached a degree the place they don’t simply have to achieve the knockouts, but additionally to raise a trophy. Final night time’s defeat makes you marvel the place India lack. It isn’t when it comes to expertise as a result of now we have among the highest-skilled gamers within the likes of Smriti Mandhana, captain Harmanpreet Kaur, Jemimah Rodrigues, Poonam Yadav, Shikha Pandey, and even the remainder of the gamers within the workforce, none of them lack in expertise in any way. A few of them have been round for an honest period of time. Then why does the story preserve repeating itself?
Perhaps it has one thing to do with the best way our home cricketing circuit has been designed. The quantity of publicity that cricketers in international locations like Australia, England, New Zealand, and South Africa get is surreal and has performed an vital issue of their dominance within the recreation. The strain in a knockout recreation is insane and the Indian workforce has made it a behavior of faltering in them. The identical goes for the lads’s workforce as nicely.
Regardless of the shortage of main event wins, there have been some particular person successes for Indian ladies cricketers. Mithali Raj is the all-time main run-scorer in ladies’s ODIs, and Jhulan Goswami is the main wicket-taker in ladies’s ODIs. General, whereas Indian ladies’s cricket has had its ups and downs in ICC occasions, the workforce is making progress and is changing into extra aggressive on the worldwide stage.
What lies subsequent for the workforce?
The induction of the WPL is a big feat within the nation. The event won’t solely give publicity to the underdogs, but it surely additionally will assist them deal with the strain problem. Take a look at Australia for instance. Ever for the reason that induction of WBBL in 2015, the state of Ladies’s cricket in Australia has improved considerably. Gamers from all world wide take part within the league, which helps them perceive the circumstances higher and study from one another. Australia have thus been in a position to dominate the Cricketing World.
The WPL may additionally assist to draw extra company sponsorship and funding in ladies’s cricket in India, which may have a constructive impression on the expansion and sustainability of the game altogether. With increasingly more assets, we will develop new skills within the nation that will assist deliver the trophy dwelling.
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