IND v ENG: 1st women's Test in India in nearly a decade brings up 50s for Jemimah Rodrigues, Shubha Satheesh

Satheesh scored 69 off just 49 balls and Rodrigues (above) made 68 off 82 deliveries to help set up India’s mammoth 410 for 7 on Day 1 of the Test against England on December 14, 2023. (File image via X)

It’s supposed to feel like an ill-fitting outfit you try on for the first time. Or an unexplored terrain you are advised to tread with caution. In the relatively unchartered territory that is a home Test for the Indian women’s cricket team, all of this – the unfamiliarity, threatening in all its eerie, unknown vastness – was supposed to apply to India batters Shubha Satheesh and Jemimah Rodrigues.

The groundwork for a challenging day at the office had been laid for them both. The first women’s Test match in India in nearly a decade: check. A relatively regular Test-playing opposition: check. That daunting opening hour of a Test match: check. Your team’s openers are back in the hut and suddenly your captain’s decision to bat first doesn’t look like the wisest choice in hindsight: check. Oh, and here’s the kicker: You are both on Test debut and the task of keeping it all together has fallen on your inexperienced shoulders: double check.

Flight or fight? Unravel or unite? Nerves: (seemingly) none. Zen: Plenty. Focus: Fierce. Outcome: Anything but how it was supposed to play out, or so the feeling might have been in opponents England’s camp.

Satheesh, 24, and Rodrigues, 23, two of India’s three debutants and among the quartet of half-centurions, played with aplomb on Day 1 of the one-off Test against England at the DY Patil Stadium on Thursday.

In the face of a potent opening burst of swing and seam bowling from England pacers Kate Cross and Lauren Bell, India’s opening pair of Smriti Mandhana and Shafali Verma had fallen prey to long-unresolved batting foibles. Attempting a cut, Mandhana chopped on for 17 when there was little room on offer while Verma, on 19, paid the price for her persistence with consistently playing inside the line. Two of India’s key batting cogs with at least a fifty against their names in the team’s previous Test outing – on hosts Australia’s shores in 2021 – were back in the dugout licking their wounds inside 8.4 overs.

That India had raced to a promising 47 in that time, however, hinted at the assistance the surface had for batters. But with the ball moving a fair bit under the breezy morning conditions in Navi Mumbai, playing every delivery per its merit was non-negotiable. Straight out of a book, right? That’s exactly what No. 3 Satheesh, making her international debut, did. Second-drop Rodrigues, for her part, with hard-earned lessons culled from over 100 appearances for India in white-ball cricket, saw merit in sticking to as well.

Classical and compact, bereft of any past baggage from outings in international red-ball cricket, both beginners put a premium on getting the basics right. The result: a rich assortment of cover drives, straight-driven along-the-carpet shots, the occasional dead bat, buoyant feet movement to go forward or backward with purpose, especially back-and-across when the line allowed for arms to be freed, with a side of delectable minimal-risk back-foot punches.

The dividends were there for everyone, the 500-odd spectators who showed up included, to see and applaud: 13 fours against Satheesh’s name and 11 against Rodrigues’ as they became 12th and 13th Indian woman, respectively, to score a 50 on Test debut. Satheesh reached her milestone off just 49 balls en route to her 69, while Rodrigues got to hers off 82 deliveries during her 68-run knock that helped set up India’s mammoth 410 for 7.

“We were just having normal conversations about plans,” Satheesh said at the post-match presser about their third-wicket 115-run partnership. “Jemimah and I have played a lot of junior-level cricket, so we have known each other for a long time. And, so, we just keep talking a lot… It’s a beautiful wicket to bat on. Jemimah and I were saying that we just have to play proper cricketing shots and keep going. That was the only thing running in my mind.”

It wasn’t just England’s crystal ball that appeared to have gone entirely off in terms of the understated counterattack Satheesh launched with Rodrigues. Former India head coach WV Raman echoed even some of the most ardent followers of women’s domestic cricket in India when he admitted he hadn’t seen Satheesh bat before but was floored with her performance on Day 1 of the Test.

Shubha Satheesh said in the post-match conference that "getting an India call-up was just like living in a dream sort of thing". (Image via Instagram/shubha_satheesh)

In many ways, if women’s Tests in India was something of an unknown leading into Thursday, Satheesh had been the faceless posterchild of the domestic talent awaiting their turn to own that space. She was, after all, picked only for the two one-off Tests in the ongoing home session, the second one is scheduled for next week against Australia. With the range she displayed against England in her maiden bow in multi-day cricket, she picks herself for that fixture.

With a dose of self-deprecating humour, she’s keeping it all in perspective. “Today morning I got to know I’ve got everything,” she said of the diversity of her shots, cracking up the room full of a dozen-odd journalists in the media centre.

A maiden Test cap, however, hasn’t come easy for Satheesh or Rodrigues. One a longtime domestic toiler and the other long having been at the receiving end of curious omissions from the limited-overs Indian side, their momentum-changing 146-ball stand is testament to the virtue of patience – and they need to exercise it on the 22-yards and beyond - and of retaining one’s natural game, even at the cost of the occasional selection snub.

Anchored in conventionality, their playing style has less to do with playing to the T20 gallery and more with the pursuit of perfecting the orthodox craft of batting itself. In the age of slam-bang cricket, it may not be the most desirable trait in a batter. However, with anchors far from falling out of currency, be it in one-dayers or modern T20 cricket – the latter more in the women’s game than the men’s - sound technique will continue to find place, as will its proponents such as Rodrigues and Satheesh.

“Hope so,” came the quietly confident reply from Satheesh when asked about her ODI chances in the future. “It’s been quite a journey for me because I have been in the domestic set-up for around 6-7 years now, and getting an India call-up was just like living in a dream sort of thing…

“Proving [myself] – I didn’t really think about that. I just had to play good cricket. That’s all I know and that’s all I believe in.”