ICC Women's World Cup 2013

While a lot has been happening and talked about Women's freedom, liberation, empowerment across the country, one big event related to women is pretty much going unnoticed and that is Women's Cricket World cup that started only yesterday in our own land with Mumbai and Cuttack as venues.
Probably every Indian know the dates of the Men's World Cup, not just for upcoming one, but even for the one happening after 8 years, but I am sure hardly anybody including me till last week had any clue about Women's Cricket World cup happening in India.
It so happened that I came across an ad which also is based on the logic that how people are ignorant about Women's Cricket. So, I decided to take some time off and watch first match of this world cup which took place in Mumbai between India and West Indies.
I had a thinking that like Men's World Cup, even here there will be an opening ceremony. But I am not sure if that at all took place.


When I started watching the match Indian openers Poonam Raut and Thirush Kamini had already scored their half centuries. Unknowingly, I started recollecting when was last time did this happened for Indian Men's opening pair!
I was amazed to see the way two players  were playing. To my surprise, their shots were strong enough to cross the boundaries and Kamini even hit a six which was fantastic.
Poonam (left) scored half century while Kamini (right) went on to score a century.




As a first down, Jhulan Goswami entered the ground. Her game and her body language reminded me of Kapil Dev. Her strokes were really strong and she looked in total control of her game.
In later part of the game, I watched her bowling and it confirmed that she is Women's version of Kapil Dev.
Her bowling is fantastic, it swings and it has a pace as good as crossing 120km/hr.
I have seen many of our present time bowler's bowling at 125-128 kms/hr.
I think Jhulan is good enough to qualify for even Men's team.

Overall, India was at its best and defeated West Indies by 105 years.
West Indies team didn't seem to be in shape. Apparently, they haven't got settled down after long journey from Caribbean islands and big time difference. But the team showed some sparks when Deandra Dottin hit 4 huge sixes and for some time brought India camp under pressure.

While India's field was ok, West Indies did badly in the field. I guess that is the part of Cricket, where Women's team are lagging behind Men's team.

As I expected, there hardly was any crowd to watch the match. I happen to see few girls who came to take a quick view of whats happening on this ground today.

I feel it is the responsibility of women to make it a point that they take interest in Women's cricket, or for that matter any women's game. Like Boys do for Men's cricket, if girls start taking interest in Women's game, openly discuss it, make their own views, talk about women players, their good game, their weaknesses and their statistics, it will start creating a buzz about Women's Cricket. If girls themselves are always fan of Sachin Tendulkar or Virat Kohli then why would somebody care about Mithali Raj or Poonam Raut or Jhulan Goswami.
I once was listening to a debate in my class on some topic related to Men Vs Women freedom, priorities etc.
All the girls had handful of things to talk about how girls are not given chances, how they are less preferred criticizing men for all the things. At that time, one of the boys put a point which really made sense and all girls went mum. It was a time when Football World Cup was on. He asked everybody and specifically girls some questions about its venue, favorite players and latest scores. Almost every girl in the class had a favorite player and were aware of the latest updates of the event. Afterwards, he told that at the same time Women's football world cup is also taking place and what updates do girls specifically and then every body else have about that event.
This changed the direction of the debate and left everybody thinking about ignorant we are about women's sports.
I request every body to spare some time and take little interest in Women's Cricket World Cup to begin with.
Here is the link from bbc giving all the fixtures for the event.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cricket/20714464

Support Cricket, Support Women

P.S : Guess we need some serious thinking to put in

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/sports/cricket/women-cricket/icc-womens-world-cup-2013/news/World-Cup-begins-but-wheres-the-crowd/articleshow/18289335.cms