Jemimah hit a hundred chasing a mammoth score, with tough-as-nails women from Australia standing between her and victory. She did not raise her bat to soak in the glory. She knew the fight was far from over, and her team had folded a few times already in the tournament with the finish line in sight.
She became the cheerleader for her tiring self, her team, and a nation that barely rallies behind its daughters. She had spent almost the entire game from the start in the hot and humid cauldron. The steely look in her eyes, the muttering to herself, and the chatter with her mates falling midway in the fight played out before thousands of compatriots. Yet she found an ounce of energy for a few more hits, as if she were riding the crescendo of a symphony.
The symphony was made of human frailties. Losing to three of the SENA teams in the lead-up to this game had sullied expectations for this side. Their bowling barely inspired confidence. Fielding was in disarray—dropping simple catches, conceding overthrows, stumbling over balls hit straight to fielders. Jemimah herself had failed and been dropped from the team a few times already, and she didn’t even know she was one down until five minutes before she was sent out.
Her captain and the oldest player in the team, Harmanpreet, was a complex soul trying to break the karmic cycles of those who walked ahead of her out of the park and toward an assured oblivion.. She carries a tortured look, as if fighting a demon that never lets her be. She, too, was cramping, but decided to lash out, believing Jemimah would anchor the ship still teetering in the tempest with a prayer. The match could very well have been her last had India lost. But the partnership with Jemimah became their ticket to redemption. Other batters brought much-needed wind to the sails, even as they faltered along the way.
There is no video of Kapil Dev’s 175 against Zimbabwe, when the World Cup-winning team was on the brink of elimination. But that team of 1983 changed the destiny of Indian cricket and the spirit of a nation. Yet it was still a man’s victory.
Women’s team coach Amol Muzumdar, too, has his tryst with destiny. He never got the chance to wear the blue, waiting in the shadows through a long career despite being one of domestic cricket’s greatest run machines. He started his career waiting for a chance to play for India, padded up and waited for an eternity and a day, while Tendulkar and Kambli batted to glory.This was his Chak De moment—seeking redemption alongside the girls who know what it means to be so near, yet so far.
But this is Jemi’s time—to change the destiny of millions of girls and help them chart their own course to the future.
It is already late.
Photo Credit: Emmanual Yogini
Chronicles 
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