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February 25 will mark 5 years since Chandigarh’s Kashvee Gautam took all 10 wickets in opposition to Arunachal Pradesh in an Underneath -19 One Day Trophy match.
Now 21 years previous and taking part in for the Gujarat Giants within the Girls’s Premier League (WPL), the pacer has put in a variety of work to enhance her bowling.
— BCCI Girls (@BCCIWomen) February 25, 2020
“My ability to swing the ball inwards was always strong. I think the pace at which I bowl has increased. Recently, I bowled at around 110 kmph. My swing has become sharper and now I hit the deck hard while bowling. Before, I would float the ball. The more you watch cricket, the more you learn,” Kashvee advised Sportstar on the sidelines of the continued iteration of the WPL.
However, she has needed to wait to indicate her evolution within the WPL.
Over the last WPL public sale, Kashvee turned the most costly uncapped participant, picked by the Giants for INR 2 crore. Nonetheless, a fracture to the fifth metatarsal of her touchdown foot, sustained in December 2023, meant that her debut was delayed.
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“My foot was in a plaster for six to seven weeks. Then, I had to walk on crutches. My rehab started slowly, a bit later because the bone wasn’t healing quickly. First it was batting. Then, I started jogging. Bowling came last,”
“Initially, it was tough to keep her motivated when it was confirmed that she would miss WPL,” Kashvee’s coach Nagesh Gupta recalled. “But she soon realised that she would have to fight with the injury in order to get better.”
Kashvee Gautam hits a boundary for Gujarat Giants of their Girls’s Premier League 2025 match in opposition to Mumbai Indians on the BCA Stadium, Vadodara.
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Sportzpics for WPL
Kashvee Gautam hits a boundary for Gujarat Giants of their Girls’s Premier League 2025 match in opposition to Mumbai Indians on the BCA Stadium, Vadodara.
| Picture Credit score:
Sportzpics for WPL
Kashvee was sidelined for nearly 10 months and returned to full health solely in October final 12 months. Nonetheless, she used this part to be taught just a few classes, that are bearing fruits now.
“It took some time but I learnt a lot. I worked on other things like my mental health. When I play now, those things are coming to use,” Kashvee stated. It was throughout these robust months that the teenager learnt the worth of being mentally sturdy.
“Mental health, at any level, plays a very important role. Until the time we aren’t fit here (pointing to the head), we won’t be able to express ourselves freely.”
Kashvee additionally had a small group of well-wishers, her rocks, to assist her get by all of it. These included her household, Nagesh, and her wellness coach Sanjeevan. “Their support was so strong that I never felt I was going through an injury,” she stated.
However there was another individual whose fixed presence helped Kashvee, considered one of her closest buddies, Kanika Ahuja.
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Kanika, taking part in her second season with Royal Challengers Bengaluru now, was as a consequence of play final 12 months after she was retained by the eventual champion. Sadly, she too was dominated out of the marketing campaign as a consequence of a stress fracture in her again.
Whereas these accidents meant no franchise cricket for each, the previous buddies made certain to be there for one another.
“My bond with her [Kanika] goes way back to when I started playing in Punjab about seven years back. Whenever we meet, it doesn’t feel like we are seeing each other after a long time,” Kashvee stated.
“Our respective teams would train and we would sit together and collectively get that feeling of missing out, but we didn’t have a choice. We supported each other during that phase. Even when we went home, we would make it a point to call each other at least once a week. Sometimes we would even complain to each other about the time our injuries were taking to heal.”
Kashvee Gautam of Gujarat Giants celebrates taking a wicket of Mumbai Indians within the Girls’s Premier League 2025 (WPL).
| Picture Credit score:
Sportzpics for WPL
Kashvee Gautam of Gujarat Giants celebrates taking a wicket of Mumbai Indians within the Girls’s Premier League 2025 (WPL).
| Picture Credit score:
Sportzpics for WPL
Kashvee recovered from her fracture simply in time for the 2024-25 home season, and pleasantly stunned herself along with her performances. In three tournaments, she took 17 wickets.
“I didn’t expect to do a good job since I had little practice,” she stated.
Kashvee’s most up-to-date home outing was the Senior Girls’s ODI Challenger Trophy, a event she gained.
“In Chennai, the wicket was quite flat. Bowling there helped me figure out a lot of things, which I have implemented here. My main aim in that tournament was to keep my economy low, and I was successful in doing that,” she stated.
Kashvee had the third-best economic system within the ODI Challenger (3.85).
Even within the ongoing WPL, she has the third-best economic system fee thus far (5.77) and the second-best economic system by a bowler in a match (3.75 vs UP Warriorz).
— Girls’s Premier League (WPL) (@wplt20) February 18, 2025
Whereas she’s constricting the move of runs fairly properly, the way in which to look impactful within the WPL is to take wickets, in response to her coach Nagesh Gupta. Kashvee hopes to repay the religion proven by the Gujarat Giants by doing simply that.
“For me, it’s a good experience but there are nerves too. Playing in front of such huge crowds for the first time but it’s becoming easier with every match.”
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