India women's T20I captain Harmanpreet Kaur took inspiration from former India captain Virender Sehwag. Her game style, which is very similar to Sehwag's, shows she followed his batting closely.
Harmanpreet talked about her first interaction with idol Sehwag in a chat with Harsha Bhogle for Cricbuzz. She had sent him a text message and received a call back in 2 seconds.
“For the first time, I had written him a text which read – Sir, I want to talk to you, if you have time please talk. You won’t believe, he called back within two seconds. I was surprised as I thought he might not read the message or check it after 10 days. He called back and it did not look like he was in a hurry to answer my queries. He gave me plenty of time, patiently listened to all my questions, and gave me advice.
"My respect for him increased after that, as earlier, we used to just dream about our favorite cricketers – to meet them and take a selfie with them. But to talk to him over the phone and that too him calling back, I think it’s very rare,” she said.
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Harmanpreet used to be nervous seeing Sehwag's batting, like any of his fans. Her brother was a Yuvraj Singh fan and there was a competition between the siblings.
“I have always followed him. I was so fond of the batting that I used to be more nervous about his batting than him before every match. I and my brother used to compete. His favorite cricketer was Yuvraj Singh, Sehwag was my favorite. Whoever scored more runs, the other person was teased throughout the day. The cricketers might not even realize this but it was a different atmosphere at our place and my mother just spent her time trying to bring the fight to an end,” the women cricketer said.
It was obvious that the Indian women's explosive batsman used to practice Sehwag's shots, who impressed her so much with his hand and eye coordination.
“I used to copy his shots while batting at the ground. His cut shot was so lethal, the ball would go for a boundary or a six if he was offered width. I prepared myself accordingly for my game. He might not know this but I practiced a lot because of him, it was my dream to become like him.
"So when kids come to me and tell me they want to become like me, I can feel that because I have gone through the same journey. I get happiness in helping them in any manner because when I was going through these things, I was clueless about where I wanted to go but I was determined to play,” she said.
