Mumbai: India women’s team opener Smriti Mandhana, who is in blazing form, said here on Friday that the team’s coach W V Raman has set her targets to bat for a specific number of overs to develop her patience at the crease. “He (Raman) has been telling me to play 30 overs in ODIs as he knows that if I bat till 30 overs, I will continue to bat. And in 20 over games he has been telling me to bat for 13 overs,” the 22-year-old Mandhana said.
“He’s giving me targets to bat a certain number of balls, because strike rate and those kinds of things never concern me, the only problem is the patience aspect. He is helping with that and giving me targets to bat through these many balls and that many overs and that is being great,” said the left-handed batswoman.
Mandhana, asked specifically whether the team was too dependent on her, replied that the perception was not correct. “No, I don’t think so. We have got a lot of match-winners in our team. It is just that sometimes someone goes through a lean patch and you need to cover up for your teammate. And sometimes that would be the case, if I am not going, the middle order will look after me (help me).
“So you can’t say that they (other batswomen) are too dependent, but I think the main responsibility as a batter is to win matches and dependence never comes (in the way),” she stressed. During last year’s women’s T20 tri-series, Mandhana had said that she was throwing her wicket away after setting herself in.
