Indian women's cricket team skipper Mithali Raj has been a busy lady ever since her return from the ICC Women's World Cup in England in July. Apart from requests for celebrity appearances, she has also been in much demand to share her views on what ails women's cricket and what needs to be done to rectify this.
Talking about what she has been up to post the world cup, Mithali revealed, “I have been very busy—I'm enjoying this phase, too. I have been speaking about women's cricket on various platforms—been doing this job for the past two months. I am very happy. Women's cricket these days is being discussed on round tables alongside men's cricket. People are following stats of women cricketers—their averages their scores, performances, etc.” She admits she only got to unpack her kit and bags post the tournament a few days ago. The time away from on-field action, though, has been long, and she's now eagerly waiting to get back into cricketing mode.
India women's team's first competitive outing after the world cup tournament will be against South Africa in an away series in February 2018. Indian women's team is scheduled to play three ODIs which will be their official ICC World Championship opener. The ODI series will be from February 5-10 with the first two ODIs to be held in Kimberly followed by one in Potchefstroom. The Twenty20 internationals will be doubleheaders as the Men in Blue, too, would be playing a series at the same time.
Raj, who was in New Delhi to unveil details about the ICC Women's Championship, spoke about taking on South Africa in February after losing to them in the world cup. India suffered a heavy defeat at the hands of the Proteas and lost by 115 runs. “I am looking forward to that series. We have been out of action for almost three to four months. I am really looking forward to getting back on the field. Longing for a game at its competitive best. SA beat us in the world cup and we want to get back at them. Also we have the ICC T20 World Cup next year—the team is looking forward to that too.”
As per the ICC Women's Championships, each team will get to play 21 ODIs between 2018-19. The next ICC Women's World Cup is in 2021. Raj expressed satisfaction with teams getting to play 21 ODIs in a season. “21 matches is good enough, I think, to have each team playing against each other. Earlier, we would get to play a maximum of 10-12 ODIs. Maybe, if boards want to squeeze in a few more they could do so, but 21 is a good number to start with,” Mithali said.
“The ICC Women’s Championship will be played in the same format as the inaugural edition which was held from 2014-16, with all eight sides—Australia, England, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa, Sri Lanka and the Windies—taking on each other in series of three ODIs on a home or away basis. Member boards will be encouraged to play T20s during tours but no other ODIs can be scheduled along with the Women’s Championship series. Teams will get two points for each win, one point for a tie or no-result and no points for a loss,” ICC stated.
Interestingly, what is missing from the women's schedule glaringly is Test cricket. England and Australia will have their women's Ashes simultaneously with the men's Ashes set to be played in Australia later this year.
“Now everybody wants to focus on T20 because next year is the world cup. I would definitely prefer playing Test cricket because for me that is the pinnacle of cricket. For young players, a good foundation comes from playing Tests, but I guess it's challenging to market Test cricket for women. People also want to see more fast-paced cricket these days,” said Raj.
