Staggering 136 wides bowled in BCCI U19 Women's match

Exposing a huge gap that still exists in Women’s cricket in India, especially at the junior level, a staggering number of wides were bowled in a BCCI U19 one-dayer between the women’s teams of Nagaland and Manipur. While Nagaland bowled 42 of those extras, Manipur had the lion’s share as they bowled 94 wides. Nagaland eventually went on to win the match by 117 runs.

The match was a part of the inaugural NE-Bihar U19 one-day competition that has been brought into being by the country’s cricket board. Although the tournament was an appreciable effort to involve the north-eastern states in the proceedings of Women’s cricket, it was reported that girls from both the states were at times not even able to land the ball on the 22-yard square. The game was held at the Nehru Stadium in Jealgora, Dhanbad.

North-eastern women cricketers require better facilities

Commenting on the dire need of better coaching facilities for the girls from the north-eastern part of the country, Naba Bhattacharjee, the Meghalaya CA top boss and the convener of NE states in BCCI, said, “There is always a beginning. As the teams from NE states will play more matches, they will certainly get better. The idea to have a one day league between NE states is to given the exposure to competitive cricket. With state of the art coaching, one can only get better,” as quoted by Sportstar.

Several BCCI officials who witnessed the match went on to admit that it’s more about bridging the “wide gap” that exists than the number of wide balls bowled.

“It looks nice to throw these girls at the deep end of the pool but when you are playing a National U-19 championship, just knowing the basics of cricket well won’t suffice. You need to be at least be competitive,” a senior BCCI official said.

Nagaland were bowled out for 215 runs in 38 overs, with only Mushkan (54) and Pori (24) being able to reach double-digit scores. In retaliation, the Manipur batting order fell apart as they were all out for 98 in 27.3 overs. Seterni (17) and Ronibala Thokchom (24) crossed the 10—run mark while Pori of Nagaland got five wickets for 16 runs.