Indian women’s cricket team’s vice-captain, Smriti Mandhana, remains unfazed by the absence of a head coach for over six months.
She sees the silver lining in receiving tips from various coaching staff members. Since Ramesh Powar’s transfer to the NCA in December, the team has been without a head coach, even during the T20 World Cup. The BCCI is actively seeking a long-term coach, and domestic stalwart Amol Muzumdar is a probable candidate.
Mandhana emphasizes the team’s focus on playing their brand of cricket and remains positive despite her struggles in the ongoing Bangladesh tour.
It’s not a very big thing in terms of players. We want to play the best brand of cricket we can. All the coaching staff that has come in has been really helpful. Sometimes it’s an advantage, new coaching staff comes with new tips and new positives. If I take it very positively then it’s a good thing.
The team’s first-ever WODI loss to Bangladesh in the series opener shows the host’s improvement, demanding India’s strong performance in all aspects of the game.
“I have been batting well in the nets and in the matches I have been getting starts. It doesn’t happen very often that I am middling the ball and still not getting runs for the team but I have been working on it. The last match for me was pretty positive, the way I was able to get the team off to a decent start but threw my wicket away. It’s more about application. My batting is going well but application hasn’t been always the way I applied,” Mandhana said.
“We played them in the Asia Cup last year, they have grown since then. On these sort of wickets their bowling attack is good. They have played a very good brand of cricket. They will be coming hard at us so we won’t be taking anything lightly. The deciding factor (for us) has been batting. Getting ourselves to a good score will be important. We have to be good in all three departments,” Mandhana said.
