On that warm afternoon in Jaipur, Smriti Mandhana was talking about her childhood, about how her mother instilled a sense of competitiveness in her.
The smile that cricket fans across the world have become so used to.
“She always used to ask me to persevere, in whatever I did, and not to leave in the middle but to go on till reaching the top,” Smriti told The Hindu . She also said she wanted to be the best batter in the world. Former New Zealand all-rounder Scott Styris even said, around that time, the difference between Smriti and the next batter in women’s cricket was the size of Mumbai. When one asked her if she was aware of that remark by Styris, she said she wasn’t, but she was happy, and smiled.
During India’s Asia Cup match against Hong Kong in Dubai, she went past Mithali Raj, the woman who almost single-handedly put Indian women’s cricket in the headlines when the sport had no takers, to become the leading scorer of international runs. And that was her 18th hundred. Also a record.
She overtook Mithali’s tally 10,868 runs during her innings of 124 off 64 balls against Hong Kong. She is now the scorer of most international hundreds in women’s cricket; she moved past Meg Lanning, the former Australian captain who hit 17 before she quit international cricket at the age of 31, and South Africa captain Laura Wolvaardt, who has an equal number of centuries.