Indian women’s cricket team captain, Mithali Raj, said that there is too much importance given to the strike rate of the players around the world and that is something she doesn’t agree with.
Raj’s comments came before India Women’s departure for New Zealand, where they will play one-off T20I and five ODIs before starting preparations for the ICC Women’s World Cup 2022.
She highlighted how players' strike-rate is always in focus, especially Indians' and stressed that the players always bat according to the situation on the field, and most importantly it is about to play an innings to win the games and build partnerships for the team, not just about strike rate.
Mithali said during a virtual press conference: “Okay, I think isn't too much importance given to strike-rate by all? It is always spoken when it comes to batting or putting up big totals. I just wanted to know if you all follow the strike rate of Indian players or players from all around the world? If you might be given an opportunity to me to enlighten, in the Australia series itself, the game which Australia won, Beth Mooney scored 50 off 80-odd balls but she went on to play match-winning knock for her team.”
The skipper further explained, “As for me, I believe that cricket is a game played on the situations on the ground and yes, it is important we keep it in mind that we need to have a decent strike-rate but in the end, it is about how batting unit revolves. When we need to score 250-270, we need to have a healthy strike rate, but having said we will not entirely focus on strike rate, it is important to play an innings to win and build partnerships.
You have to play to get your team out of a hole sometimes. There will always be areas to address, no team is perfect. We will look to post a total of around 250-270 consistently and this requires a top-order batter to be consistent. Lower-order contributing also helps, it is good to have depth in the team and smaller tail, I would say.”
Mithali also spoke about her two-decade-long journey, saying: “I think it has been a wonderful journey, not an easy one. There have been struggles but there have been good times too.”
She signed off by saying, “I think it has come a full circle, my first World Cup was in 2000 in New Zealand and here I am flying to New Zealand for my sixth World Cup. In the 2000 World Cup, India played the semi-finals and lost, this time I want we play the finals and we win. Winning the World Cup has always driven me and it still drives me.”
India squad for 5 ODIs against New Zealand and ICC Women's World Cup, 2022:
Mithali Raj (captain), Harmanpreet Kaur (vice-captain), Smriti Mandhana, Shafali Verma, Yastika Bhatia, Deepti Sharma, Richa Ghosh (wicket-keeper), Sneh Rana, Jhulan Goswami, Pooja Vastrakar, Meghna Singh, Renuka Singh Thakur, Taniya Bhatia (wicket-keeper), Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Poonam Yadav.
(With ANI Inputs)
