In cricket, Australia rarely lose. In women's cricket, they almost never do. In 2017, India ended a world-record streak of 26 ODI victories when they defeated Meg Lanning's Australia in the semi-final of the Women's World Cup in Bristol. It took one of the greatest knocks in ODI history to halt the juggernaut – Harmanpreet Kaur's iconic 171.
That day, a 16-year-old girl in Mumbai—already a hockey champion – sat glued to her television. She had recently made the difficult decision to give up her hockey stick for a cricket bat, trading one dream for another. As Harmanpreet Kaur slog-swept the Aussie spinners into the stands in Bristol, something clicked in Jemimah Rodrigues. The 2017 World Cup lit a fuse—the way Kapil's Devils of 1983 once did for Sachin Tendulkar—whispering that there was a road ahead, that she, too, could do it one day.
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Women's World Cup semifinal scorecard
Days later, at Mumbai airport, a young Jemimah waved the tri-colour as Mithali Raj and her team walked through the arrival gates. They had lost the final at Lord's, but in Jemimah's eyes, they were anything but defeated. That team had lit a spark—not just in Indian cricket, but in every girl who had ever picked up a bat.
The 2017 semi-final wasn't just a red-letter day for Indian cricket; it was one for A
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