The rise and roar of Kashvee Gautam

Later that year, Gautam was selected for the Women’s T20 Challenge, for Trailblazers. While she didn’t get to play, the experience was “an eye-opener”.”The cricket that I saw there was completely different,” she says. “When I bowled to the likes of Smriti [Mandhana] and [Deandra] Dottin in the nets, I realised I needed to improve a lot.”She didn’t take long to level up. In November 2023, she picked up 5 for 8, and yet another hat-trick, against North-East Zone in the inter-zonal T20 trophy. When England A toured India, she turned the first T20 around with two wickets in one over.All that paved the way for the record bid at the WPL auction.

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Gautam loves tattoos. She has one of Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati inked on her right biceps and a trident on the left forearm. Just above the trident is a big “NO” striking out fear, limits, and excuses.There is another tattoo on her left biceps that looks something like: G > ^ v.”It means God is greater than my ups and downs,” Gautam says. But when the down of the foot injury came, she found herself in a very negative space.Initially, the Giants team management took care of her. “Mithali Raj [then team mentor] and Michael Klinger, our coach, asked me to stay with the squad in Bengaluru,” Gautam says. “I wondered what I would do here. But they took me to every practice session and asked me to sit behind the nets and observe. I started noticing what each batter and bowler was doing and what I could add to my game. When I came back to Chandigarh, I discussed it with Nagesh sir.”Related

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But the injury was taking a long time to heal, which confined Gautam to her house. She wasn’t used to that. “After one point, I started feeling suffocated. I would have negative thoughts every day. ‘Will I be fine or not? Will I ever make a comeback?’ Slowly, it turned into anxiety.”Thankfully, Gautam has a good support system that includes her coach, his wife, and a mental-fitness coach, and they suggested meditation exercises, maintaining a gratitude journal which “helped a lot”.The self-doubt was still lingering, though. “Since I hadn’t bowled for so many months, it felt as if I had forgotten how to bowl,” Gautam says. “I was worried my first ball after the recovery would go and hit one of the poles on either side of the net. But all the visualisation I did during the injury period came in handy.”Gautam made a steady comeback to domestic cricket. To prepare for the WPL, her coach made her bowl on flat pitches.”Because if you can bowl well on flat wickets, you can bowl well anywhere,” Gautam says. “For batting, I developed a few more shots, especially against spinners, because they bowl most of the overs on Indian wickets. So I practised the sweep and the reverse sweep a lot.”But when the much-awaited WPL debut came, against Royal Challengers Bengaluru, nerves got the better of her. Mandhana and Danni Wyatt-Hodge carted her for three fours in her first over. She bowled just one more over in the match and finished with 0 for 22.Nagesh Gupta with Kashvee Gautam and Amanjot Kaur•Nagesh Gupta”Everyone came to me and said, ‘It doesn’t matter, it happens. Everyone gets hit. This is your first match, so just enjoy.’ Before the next match, I watched a lot more videos of the opposition and planned for each batter.”In the next game against UP Warriorz, Kashvee picked up 1 for 15 from four overs. She had arrived. Against MI, she dismissed Harmanpreet and Amelia Kerr lbw. Against Delhi Capitals, she uprooted Meg Lanning’s off stump and had Annabel Sutherland caught behind. In the reverse fixture against RCB, she troubled Mandhana with her swing and yorked Richa Ghosh.The nerves are no more there – something that is evident from the manner in which she takes a bow, à la Shubman Gill, after taking a wicket. However, her fielding has come under a bit of scrutiny. In the MI game, she misfielded twice in three balls at deep-backward square-leg. On both occasions, the ball went for four.”It happened because of the dew and lights,” Gautam says. “As we hardly get to play day-night matches in domestic cricket, I had no experience of fielding in those conditions.”Gupta concurs. “It was more of a surprise for me than an area for improvement, because Kashvee has always been a good fielder.” He is confident we will see a much better version of Gautam the fielder in the coming days. Moreover, compared to the challenges she has overcome so far, this doesn’t even qualify as a “down”.