Cricketers of the week: 10th July – 16th July
The Women’s World Cup is happily chugging along as women cricketers from around the keep on inspiring us with the outstanding levels of commitment and skills. And we now have our four semi-finalists – India thumping New Zealand against the odds to take the fourth slot after Australia, England and South Africa already made it.
In the men’s game, the Proteas have their own talisman back in the form of Faf du Plessis and they look like a different side, putting England under pressure. Away teams are having it great as Zimbabwe might surprise and embarrass Sri Lanka further, with a sizeable lead in the third innings of the only Test between the two teams at the time of writing this piece.
With so much competition, it was tough to pick just five cricketers, but we simply couldn’t leave out two brilliant women from India who gave New Zealand a might hiding.
#1 Mithali Raj
She is making headlines for all the right reasons, be it her brilliant retorts in the press conferences or with a photo of hers reading Rumi all geared up to bat going popular on the internet. She is scoring runs at will, crossing 6000 ODI runs, the first woman player to do so.
Raj topped off the effort to help India break a losing streak and beat New Zealand in a virtual quarter-final taking India to the semi-final of the World Cup. Batting first, India were in a spot of bother at 21 for 2. The skipper, however, played a ‘captain’s knock’ scoring 109, adding 123 with Harmanpreet Kaur who scored a 90-ball 60.
She then went on to add 108 off just 13 overs for the fifth wicket with Veda Krishnamurthy. Mithali scored her sixth century and fell in the final over. India eventually were able to manage 265 in their 50 overs and then went on to steamroll New Zealand, who were all out for 79 to give India an 186-run victory!