2019 was a special year for the India Women’s cricket team. It was a year where the team continued to consolidate its strong standing in the annals of the international game. Harmanpreet Kaur, taking care of both forms of the limited-overs captainship, took the side to new highs, in contests held both at home and overseas.
There were lots of entertaining, hard-fought, and exciting series that were played from the onset of January in a year where the team’s limited overs form was perhaps better than it’s ever been.
Central to the team’s memorable triumphs all around the world- whether in New Zealand, at home, or as seen toward the close of the year, in the West Indies, was the performance of the youth.
The likes of Jemimah Rodrigues, Poonam Yadav, Deepti Sharma were consistent and on point in the batting and bowling departments, respectively. But implicit in India’s consistent spell of victories, orchestrated by the power of its youth’s talent, was a special find. And it may not be wrong to call this the find of international cricket in 2019: Shafali Verma, who in a very short span of time, with hardly any sizable playing experience under her belt, seems like a cricketer who is here to stay.
But that said, let’s find out some of the best moments for India Women’s team in 2019
Women’s IPL- Beginning Of A New Chapter In Women’s Cricket
The first-ever Women’s IPL was the natural order of the day after the exhibition-cum-inaugural one-off T20 held during the last year attracted so many from around the world.
Paving a key role toward garnering more attention than before towards the women’s game, the 4-game series, a first of its kind for India, along the lines of the Women’s Big Bash League and the Kia Super League was a highly sought-after contest.
Featuring the contemporary greats of the game and the rising stars from around the world, India was the focus of all eyes as 3 teams- IPL Supernovas, IPL Trailblazers and IPL Velocity- locked horns under the burning sun of Jaipur, in Rajashthan, for a period of 6 exasperating but thrilling days.
Featuring talents of the class of Stafanie Taylor, Hayley Matthews, Chamari Atapattu, Sophie Devine, and the likes, India became a melting pot of some of the brightest cricketing talents to have emerged, of lately.
While the Harmanpreet-led Supernovas emerged as the top-liners in the 3-team cricketing fest, it wasn’t before the likes of Jemimah- 123 runs, the most in the series and Amelia Kerr- most wickets, 6, for Velocity- exerted their might. The starting of a tournament that one hopes will continue in the times was inarguably, one of the best moments for India Women’s team in 2019.
Smriti Mandhana Making It To Both ICC Teams Of The Year- T20, ODI
Few batswomen inspire as much as they induce envy. Smriti Mandhana’s all-round success bolstered by the left-hander being in dismissive form in both versions of the limited-overs game, contributed to India’s memorable series wins against New Zealand and England. Mandhana gave a clear indication of her intentions right at the start of the year when she struck her 4th ODI hundred in the form of her 104-ball-105, at a strike rate of over 100, in the 5o-over series against the White Ferns.
Leaving the likes of Bates, Devine, Kaspererk, Kerr clueless on how to bowl, the mighty good form continued in the Second ODI, where she blasted a 90, at a strike rate of 108.
Next up in Mandhana’s sights were England, who were treated with quintessential ease and should one also say some disdain, as the belligerent striker of the white-ball, struck two definitive fifties, her 63 off 74 in the 2nd ODI, following up with a 66 off 74 in the next game.
Mandhana’s big moment of reckoning came at the very end of the year as the world stood up to applaud one of the fiercest batswomen around, someone who found a place in both ICC ODI and T20 women’s teams for 2019. Mandhana’s free-striking ways throughout the year made for one of the best moments for India Women’s team in 2019.
The Rise Of Shafali Verma
India finished their mega-successful year by blanking the Windies women on their own turf. But in doing so, it didn’t require something magnificent either, to be honest, as one central figure from a young India’s camp seemed determined to do the damage on her own.
Shafali Verma, all of 15, scored 158 runs, including 2 powerful match-winning fifties from just 5 games, in her maiden T20 series. While the Windies somehow managed to deny India a win by claiming the very first limited-overs contest (a one-dayer), the hosts plummeted to 9 successive defeats from thereon giving a clear idea of the kind of form India were in.
Excellent ODI form of the team throughout the year
The Indian Women’s cricket team displayed terrific form in the 50-over format of the game. Throughout the year, there was nearly non-stop cricketing action that took Harmanpreet’s ladies around the world, starting with a series in New Zealand to playing England and later, South Africa at home, before, one of the most powerful sides in the game rounded up the year at the Caribbean.
But what stood out in the process of playing constantly attacking and focused cricket was India’s ability to hold to its own against competitive and vastly respected sides.
You can’t offer anything else but utter respect to a team that, in the process of playing 12 ODIs in 2019, won 9 and lost only 3.
India began the year on a promising note, restricting a team filled with exuberant and big-hitting batswomen of New Zealand in a 2-1 triumph, in the White Ferns’ own territory.
Exceptional batting performances by Smriti Mandhana, who scored a century and a fifty each in 3 games helped India counter the ever-present New Zealand threat. But victory wouldn’t have been achieved minus the combined effectiveness lent by economical bowling performances of the spinners- Deepti Sharma, Poonam Yadav, and Ekta Bisht taking 7 wickets among them.
India countered England magnificently at home during the summers, in exhibiting dominant performances in each of the three departments of the game. Once again, Mandhana’s menacing consistency, expressed by two quick-fire fifties enabled India to rise head and shoulders above England, not always the easiest of teams to beat
In the same series, the spinners attacked in tandem, the popular trio of Ekta Bisht, Deepti Sharma, and Poonam Yadav taking 10 wickets among them.
Later, toward the approaching winters, India made the Proteas Women shiver in a series where the visitors just weren’t able to seize any initiative whatsoever, Harman’s team winning both the T20s and the ODI series with overwhelming comfort.
While the injured Smriti Mandhana stayed out of the ODIs, it didn’t seem that the team took it as a jolt as together with Mithali, Harman and Jemimah’s explosive batting with the spinners being in as good a form as they’d ever been, there was just no easy day for Sune Luus’ hapless side.
India’s stronghold over South Africa was evident by the fact that with the possible exception of the final T20, the Proteas’ last-ever game on that tour, there was not a single game that India lost.
In ensuring that South African batters hit rock bottom, India didn’t allow the visitors to register a 250-run score in any of the ODIs while the Proteas women were only able to go past the 100-run mark in a T20 on two occasions.
A Year Where The Spinners Foxed Anyone and Everyone
It was a year where the spinners cut a special mark, denting the confidence of some of the world’s best batswomen in the game, whether it was the likes of Suzie Bates, Sophie Devine, or a Stafanie Taylor, Hayley Matthews or Lizelle Lee.
And perhaps the ability of the spinners; the foxy turners of the ball to constantly have a say in narrating the theme of the contest is what makes the women’s game such a delight to watch on occasions.
For India, the spin department made a mighty impression throughout the year, thanks to the exploits of the clever and foxy Poonam Yadav, the passionate Deepti Sharma and the young Radha Yadav.
With 3 capable and potent spinners of such class, the fact that each of India’s foxy turners of the ball have age on their hands, Radha still in her teens, it seems the coming years will have India saying a lot in the department of turn and flight.
For Radha, her 3 for 23 against South Africa in the 5th T20 in Surat, an effort that removed the captain Sune Luus cheaply, the dangerous Nadine de Klerk and Anne Bosch in the lower order was a magnificent display of spin bowling.
But if one were to pick perhaps the most standout spinner from India then one would, without much doubt, point to the petite but promising Poonam Yadav. The right-arm leg spinner, whose distinct ability to outwit batswomen with the quintessential flight and the ability to constantly pitch the ball around the off-stump struck cunning blows all throughout the year.
While Poonam picked 6 wickets in the 3-match ODI series in New Zealand, she kept up the good work in the sub-continent, picking 4 wickets in the 3 games against England at Mumbai, while also rounding up a successful year through her 5 wickets in the Caribbean.
Thus far, not a single batswoman, it could be said has found a way to out-trick India’s promising leg-spinner. The Harman-led side would hope it stays that way in 2020.