‘Yeah, it feels good but yeah there are a lot of places we can still improve as a team’- Jemimah Rodrigues 

Jamimah Rodrigues Happy After Match-Winning 100: The support from the audience in Rajkot was loud, as has been the case everywhere India has played at home in recent years. Rodrigues expressed great satisfaction with the support she got and hoped that the players from India would continue to encourage more females to pursue the sport in their nation. 

“Honestly, their energy is at a dierent level. So, I enjoy it a lot on the ground because I love feeding o the energy of the crowd and non-stop I think from morning to evening they are shouting so hats o to them and it was so nice to see Saurashtra Cricket supporting schools to come and watch the game because you never know if we as a team can inspire even one person from there, it is a big win for us.” 

The worldwide career of Jemimah Rodrigues has been a wild trip. The 24-year-old experienced the highs and lows quite suddenly, going from being hailed as a tremendous prospect to then being removed from the white-ball setup. The fact that Rodrigues had been moved up and down the order in a variety of hitting positions didn’t assist her case either. 

However, under the current team management, the thinking seems to be to utilize her as a middle-order batter and it was fitting that her maiden international ton came while batting in the aforementioned role.

‘Long-Awaited’: Jamimah Rodrigues Happy After Match-Winning 100

Close to 7 years and 41 innings is what has taken Rodrigues to register her first three-figure score after having made her ODI debut in 2018. Therefore, the feeling of gratefulness and pure sheer joyousness in her expression was evident at the post-match press conference. 

“Yeah, it feels great, It was a long-awaited one but I am so happy I could do it for the team today,” gushed Rodrigues. 

After the smashing 116-run win for the home side with a single game to be left. Her maiden international ton was laced with history as India registered their highest-ever total in ODIs, a mammoth 370/5 in 50 overs. Rodrigues was dealt a double whammy, but she decided to remain rooted at this time of success. 

“Yeah, it feels good but yeah there are a lot of places we can still improve as a team because we always look to keep improving and we have spoken that when we do well we will try and be a little more critical about how we can get better than that. So, yeah, next game, hope so, 400.” 

One of the best things about India, other than Rodrigues, has been how well the new opening pair has played from their first time together. Smriti Mandhana and Pratika Rawal both reached fifties, thus helping their third hundred partnerships within just five innings. They have also made a fifty-plus partnership. The 156-run stand today was, in fact, the fastest 150-plus stand by an Indian pair in ODIs. A solid platform upfront is a big box tick if any side wants to hit a big score, which was also acknowledged by Rodrigues. Mandhana and Rawal did depart from Rodrigues and Harleen Deol had to stay stable for longer to build their partnership initially. 

“Yeah, of course, if your openers give you that kind of a start, you know, it is always much more easier for us to handle the middle overs and take it well but yeah, two back-to-back wickets so Harleen and I had to just give ourselves some time because I think Ireland bowlers were also on top at that time. So, I think one thing about 50 over matches, you know, we can take a little bit of time and that is what we did, we calculated it well, we said till the 40th over we will just play risk-free cricket and we know we can always make up for it.” 

While she was keen to get to her maiden century, Rodrigues insisted that it wasn’t something that was affecting her during her stay at the crease, especially as she went deeper into the innings. Having missed out on potential opportunities in the recent past, she was keen to go the full distance today. 

“I honestly did not think of it till I think I was around in my 80s but again I just tried to keep small-small targets and just kept achieving it and I like the way that I shifted gears today because initially I showed a lot of patience which was again a big positive for me because it is important for me to spend time there to get those runs and, you know, I was getting the runs but I was not spending enough time to make it bigger so I was happy I could do that today.” 

Rodrigues was clearly furious at going out the way she did, and she only managed nine in the first game of the series. Known for showing her emotions on the field, she described how having a lot of emotions, no matter how high or low, keeps her going. 

“I was very angry at myself but at the same time I needed to be positive towards myself because that works for me, you know, if I keep being too harsh on myself I go very low but it was important for me to keep being positive rather than thinking, okay, I got out but next match what I could do better, what I needed to do so I tried to get back to, I have scored hundreds in U-19, scored 200 as well, so I tried to get back to what I used to do then and today I tried to apply it and it came out well.”

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