MUMBAI: Over the years, Deepti Sharma has been India’s rock, both with the bat and the ball. With 22 wickets in nine matches at 20.40, and 215 runs at 30.71, with three half-centuries, the 28-year-old ace off-spinning allrounder played a stellar role in India’s Women’s 2025 ODI World Cup triumph in Oct-Nov last year.However, Depti’s performances in T20 cricket haven’t been up to her usual high standards this year. In the WPL, she took seven wickets in eight matches at 31.42, at an economy rate of 8.80 and scored just 131 runs at 21.83 as the UP Warriorz failed to make it to the playoffs.In the ongoing five-match T20I series in South Africa, Deepti has failed to take a wicket so far, conceding 0-24 (in 2.1 overs) and 0-23 (in three overs) in the first two games in Durban, besides scoring 1* and 1 in India’s six-wicket and eight-wicket defeats.
Missing Deepti’s knack of taking wickets and putting the opponents on the backfoot, India have gone down 0-2, and are in danger of losing the series if they are beaten in the third match at the Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg on Wednesday.Exuding confidence in Deepti rediscovering her best, India’s bowling coach Aavishkar Salvi said in a virtual pre-match presser from Johannesburg, “See, Deepti is a champion player. We all know that. I mean, one, two games or three games doesn't justify the kind of talent she is, the kind of performance she has done over the years.
We all know that she has been a champion player. She’s been a champion bowler, batter, and all-rounder throughout her career.”The former India pacer said that Deepti was working hard in the nets to find her best form again.“So, she is not at her best as of now, but going into the drawing room, she is working hard, she is working hard on her fitness and on her bowling. In the nets, she is always there taking up those challenges where she is also bowling against the batter, she is also doing target bowling practice and she is discussing all her game plans, what she wants to use during the games,” Salvi said.Salvi backed the India women’s team to bounce back in the series from this point.
“I always thought that it will be a great series for us, where we would be challenged by a strong opposition and it was a good preparation for us for the upcoming T20 World Cup (In England in June). And obviously, we came charged up, prepared and fully motivated. Two games doesn't justify what sort of a side we are.
So, there are another three games to go and the girls are feeling comfortable and confident about their own abilities and I'm sure they are going to bounce back stronger,” he asserted.The India bowling coach said that India had their plans ready in the first two T20Is against the Proteas, but couldn’t execute them as they wanted to.“In Durban, we were trying, we tried our plans, we were actually working on them. And we couldn't execute the plans as we would have wanted it to. Going ahead, we have already identified the grey areas and we have ironed it out.
The girls are aware about it and they are practicing it."Before coming into the series also, we had practiced those plans, but somehow we couldn't execute them in the two games that we had. But obviously, girls are motivated and experienced enough to understand where they are missing out and they'll come back stronger,” Salvi explained.