Deepti Sharma – the imperfect jack of all trades seeking to master the game

It’s not easy being captain. More so in a tournament final. You are tasked with motivating 11 nervous (in varying degrees) players while also reassuring the nagging doubts in your head as you set to seek glory. Deepti Sharma’s heart rate must have been at its upper limits on Thursday morning as she stepped out with teammate Uma Chetry with 153 runs left for her side – East Zone – to chase vs South Zone in the Inter-Zonal red-ball tournament.

Deepti has been a source of calm for East in the three games played during this tournament. What she missed out on during the Women’s Premier League – dominating bowling charts – she more than made up for here with 27 scalps to her name, imperiously ahead of the rest of the field. She has been crucial with the bat too, helping bring stability to an inexperienced batting order that is still learning the demands of long format cricket.

“I texted Deepti before her final to wish her luck saying, ‘I think she’s enjoying the format,’” Lisa Sthalekar, Deepti’s team mentor at WPL outfit UP Warriorz tells  Sportstar. “Deepti replied saying, ‘I think it’s my favourite format.’ Yeah, she is pretty good at it, to be honest.”

Identity crisis

The 26-year-old barely betrays emotions. Extremes may be curdling her nerves within, but there’s no sign of it on the exterior. And so, a slight identity crisis that she’s been unravelling in the pursuit of a solution often slips under the radar, with the discourse often stuck at adaptability and form. Change to an observer may be easy and even expected, but the one going through will tell you of the seismic shifts it entails. Deepti faced a predicament of the sort, which ate into her first season in the WPL. She was still trying to figure out her essence as an all-rounder, particularly in the T20 game, when all her skills were pointing to finesse in the longer formats of the game. This often comes down to a matter of confidence and mindset. Deepti was no different.

“I remember speaking to her during the first edition and telling her that, she should be dominating this competition. This is a competition built for all-rounders, and out of the big names in Indian women’s cricket, she is THE all-rounder, so she should dominate,” Lisa remembers.

READ | Women’s Inter Zonal Multi-Day Trophy 2024 Final: East Zone beats South by one wicket on day three in a thrilling fashion

“The changes she made were evident. In one of the earlier games this season, she looked to loft the ball over mid-off instead of sweeping but got caught. I remember speaking to her after the match and telling her how that was the right call, even if it resulted in a wicket. The execution wasn’t there, but we needed that change. Everyone knows she’s going to sweep. So she’s got to show people that she’s got other things. She eventually went on to have a wonderful tournament. She was carrying the team by herself in some stages,” the former Australian captain beams.

“Her ability to hit straight sixes just shows how adaptable and clever she is. She reads the game very well. We’ve known that with her bowling, but she managed to get that into her batting too.”

Not only did she have a scintillating run with the bat, finishing as the fifth-highest run-scorer with 295 runs (she even held the Orange Cap for a while), she was able to improve her scoring rate from 83.33 in season one to an impressive 136.57 this time. That’s no easy jump. Her highest score rose between editions from 22 to an unbeaten 88. She managed only 11 boundaries last time but registered 34 boundaries and eight sixes this time around. It was almost like watching a whole new player for some parts of the season.

This mental muddle she left behind could also be because of how starkly opposite her playing roles are at the domestic and international levels. Deepti enjoys batting up the order and even opens for her state and zonal sides. In the Indian setup, she is preferred lower down, with faith wrested in her ability to clear the ropes. It hasn’t always worked, but WPL 2024 certainly cleared a bit of the fog for her. A month or so later, Deepti was able to switch back to ‘Test’ mode in the Inter Zonals, with the ability to grind out an innings, wear down opposition and defend till the end of time.

“I think she has time on her hands. She knows her game and her strengths intimately. She can leave balls that aren’t in her area and has got time and patience. She doesn’t care if you’ve set a field to trap her on the offside and you’ve opened the leg side field. She’ll keep leaving and defending till the ball is there to be played. She doesn’t get flustered,” Lisa explains in her assessment of Deepti’s red ball comfort.

“She opens domestically, but in the Indian side, she has been slotted lower and lower which reduces the time she has. Now your game is being dictated by the situation, and that didn’t quite sit with who she was as a player. Maybe that drove her systems to push her a bit. We did so, too. We assured her that she had all the shots and wanted her to play them. One thing she said after the first couple of games was, ‘Put me higher, I’ll get the job done.’ And, when things were not working for us, we pushed her up, and she did well. That takes a lot of courage and self-belief to be able to deliver, and she did it in spades through the season. We were all so happy. Within our team, we had a player of the tournament pick, and she won it hands down,” she adds.

Always room to learn

With the ball, even though Deepti finished with nine wickets in as many games in the WPL last season, there were patches where she was getting smashed for runs, particularly sixes. She conceded 309 runs in 209 balls last season and improved that to 217 runs off 180 balls this year. She even became the first Indian to register a hat trick in the tournament.“I usually score the game as I watch it like I would during my playing days, and so I looked through my sheets and then sat her down and said, ‘You’re a much better player than this. I get it that the pitch is good, the batters are strong, and the boundaries are strong, but you’re better than getting whacked for most sixes in our team,’” Lisa remembers.

Tightening her technique, keeping things simple with line and length, and her general tactical acuity in the game have helped Deepti immensely with the ball.

There also is a learning curve when it comes to handling high-pressure situations in a chase that boils down to the lower order that Indian cricket has grappled with for the better part of the decade. In the Inter Zonals, a lack of communication left Deepti and Richa Ghosh, her East batting partner, on the same side. It was a simple run out for South to effect as Richa tried to put on a stoic mask over what was quite clearly boiling rage below. That runout shook up the East Zone skipper a bit. The unforced risk-taking began creeping in, runs were a bit nervy, and she was reacting rather than taking command even of communication with her partner. Eventually, Deepti was dismissed, courtesy- a sweep shot that the opposition saw coming from a mile away with a considerable part of the target yet to be shaved off.

“I feel like the Indian players are very emotional,” Lisa chimes in. “I look at players like Meg Lanning and Alyssa Healy or even someone like Pat Cummins as captain… Jaydev Unadkat is being belted for runs, and he comes along smiling saying, ‘It’s alright mate, what’s your plan? We’ll set the field accordingly.’ You know when you’re on top of the game is when Indian players start having words, not at you, but at each other almost. It’s not to say it’s a bad thing or a good thing. It’s just there, and it sets them apart from the others. Maybe for some, it gets under their skin, and they tend to focus on it or it may rile them up. It can work both ways,” she adds.

Evolution as a leader

While she works on staying ahead of the pack with bat and ball, her biggest task was to lead a patched-up side on short notice to victory in a tournament held over 2.5 weeks in the gruelling dry heat in Pune. Across three games, Deepti’s 27 wickets (including three five-plus wicket hauls) and 157 runs, sometimes in key situations, which helped steady the East ship, were not her only contributions. Her leadership was tested against spirited opponents like North and South Zone, and she emerged with the biggest seal of success – a trophy.

While Deepti’s experience and seniority in the domestic circuit has seen her take on leadership roles before, the WPL helped her level those skills up in a more competitive pool. She found an ally in fierce international rival Alyssa Healy, who she was deputy to in UPW.

“Alyssa and Deepti’s relationship… When an Indian player was coming on or a domestic player was unseen in the international scene, there was smooth information sharing between the two and even from people like Rajeshwari Gayakwad and Gouher Sultana about their scoring areas and potential spaces for us to use. So that trust was there. We had a senior leadership group that would get together before every match day. Information would be shared, and Deepti was the only Indian in that group, but she was very comfortable in sharing her thoughts. It’s only now that they’re getting to play with people they disliked as rivals. There was a time when Deepti, Alyssa, and the senior players were all trying to figure out…’ Okay where do we all sit? How much do we trust one another?’ You’re bringing different walks of life together and trying to get them to click. This year, it was different. It was like a family coming together,” Lisa explains.

That faith, that metaphorical trust fall, has helped Deepti take help, and heed advice, which she is quick to act on and move away from a certain rigidity that was associated with her.

To have a player of her calibre sharpening the prongs of her trident so imperiously in a World Cup year can only be a good sign for India. Much like Lisa and Co. urge Deepti to do for their franchise, it’s up to her to go out there and finish the job!