IND vs AUS: Bursting with potential

Always the bridesmaid never the bride Indiarsquos heartbreaking loss to Australia is another nearmiss in the everincreasing list of such dalliances for our womenrsquos cricket team in recent years Questions about the mentality of the squad and whether the team have the temperament to get over the line may seem to be obvious during this time But these doubts are misplacedThis team are bursting with potential and will have its date with destiny eventuallyIt can be argued that the Indian womenrsquos cricket team stand on the cusp of greatness and itrsquos often the final step that is the hardest Sporting success is as much a matter of luck as it is of merit You canrsquot win a lottery if you donrsquot buy a ticket and our women keep turning up tickets in hand ready for fate to return the favourSometimes the first ones are won by being the last ones left standing It is not always a procession of perfection to the summit Sometimes you get there crawling bloodied and bruised The Indian womenrsquos cricket team have plenty of bruises now and it may have to crawl to the finish line Winning their first senior World Cup is inevitable It is not a matter of if but whenIt is important to contextualise the Indian teamrsquos performances with a lesson in history Pre2005 the year that BCCI took over womenrsquos cricket there were four competitive teams on the circuitndashAustralia England New Zealand and India India could be counted as the team punching above its weight The rest had relatively better systemic support and didnrsquot suffer from the weight of history From 2005 to 2017 Indian womenrsquos cricket suffered a state of neglect In that time many other teams seemed to have caught up or seemingly overtaken us West Indies Sri Lanka South Africa for example Instead of playing as many games as the likes of England and Australia and professionalising the sport at the pace of other international teams we were left stagnant The 2017 World Cup changed all that Make no mistake we punched above our weight even then We had no business beating Australia in the semifinal and we had one hand on the trophy before it all fell apartBetter match fees a boostWhile the national team blew hot and cold pre2017 a quiet revolution was brewing on the domestic circuit As a cricketer who grew up playing the age group levels before 2005 the introduction of respectable match fees is perhaps the point where things perceptively shifted While I was playing age group cricket you had the likes of a Punam Raut or an MD Kamini who stood out as future India players There werenrsquot a whole lot of the finished articles floating around then The senior level is where the cream was And the jump from the junior to the senior level was a discernible one After some time away from the game when I returned to the sport around 2017 the landscape had changed dramatically I could count a few of these ldquostand outsrdquo within my own state circuit It was humbling knowing that if I had been 16 then I wouldnrsquot make the state under16 team It points to an unbelievable level of grassroots talentAlso readIndia vs Ireland live streaming How to watch Womens T20 World Cup 2023 liveThe fact that India has just won the inaugural under19 World Cup should indicate the level of talent going around on the domestic circuit That India won despite England and Australia participating is the real marker of the health of Indian womenrsquos cricketing talent There is not much that separates us from England and Australia in terms of depth of talent The difference lies purely in the historical head start they have over us and one they were allowed to keep in the years since the merger with the BCCI The pre2017 years have been a huge opportunity missed in terms of catching up with these two teams that will always be the main stumbling block to winning the World Cup We didnrsquot play as often as them we didnrsquot get paid a similar level and we frankly didnrsquot take womenrsquos cricket as seriously as them Things have largely changed now But it is important to remember that the WBBL started eight years ago India will have their first womenrsquos IPL in a fortnight Our players werenrsquot even allowed to participate in the WBBL before 2016Need that sucker punchIndian womenrsquos cricket has been going toetotoe with the Australian and England teams for a few years now All that is lacking is the sucker punch I feel it is pertinent to point out that a certain Jurgen Norbert Klopp had lost six finals in a row before he finally won the Champions League with Liverpool Our women suffer from a similar weight of history but it is with relentless positivity and resilience that hoodoos are overcome In the now immortal words of Stevie G ldquowe go againrdquoThe writer a former cricketer who represented Jharkhand and Delhi University is a policy analyst working at the intersection of sports and social policy