Why Indian women cricketers are still knocking at the doors of greatness

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Editor's note: Two parallel narratives have been doing the rounds since the Indian women’s team made a tearful exit at the semifinal stage of the recent World T20 Championship: One, that the star-studded team routinely punches below its weight, particularly in clutch situations, because their basics—fielding, catching, running between wickets—are below par, and two, that the Women’s Premier League, which has finally arrived to a fanfare of ‘Aali Re’ hoardings and full-page advertisements in the newspapers, is the panacea we have been waiting for. No surprises there—we cricket fans like our post-mortems simple, solutions ditto. But for some reason, I found myself thinking of Dane van Niekerk, the South African star who wasn’t there when her team made its run to the T20 final in front of cheering home crowds. In a version of the game where quality all-rounders are worth gold (or, in this case, worth Rs 30 lakh to the Royal Challengers Bangalore), van Niekerk is South Africa’s second highest T20 run-getter, next only to Lizelle Lee, and third highest wicket-taker behind only Shabnim Ismail and Marizanne Kapp. She is …