Meet Mugdha Bavare who is keeping the Indian women’s cricket team afloat

India’s Harmanpreet Kaur (R) and Jhulan Goswami (L) celebrate the wicket of England's Amy Jones during the 2022 Women's Cricket World cup match between England and India at the Bay Oval in Tauranga on March 16. Players have said that having a sports psychologist to talk to has helped them.

India’s on again, off again ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup campaign is hardly making a splash. But India’s campaign has support of at least one swimmer who is hoping to help keep the side afloat during the ongoing tournament in New Zealand.

Her name is Mugdha Bavare, a former swimmer with over 500 gold medals across age groups, according to her profile on LinkedIn.

What does a swimmer have to do with India’s cricket campaign?

Mugdha is a sports psychologist who has been roped in to help the Indian team in the tournament. She has been working with the side remotely for the past year, but just for the World Cup she has been travelling in person. By the looks of it, despite the campaign going completely haywire, Mugdha’s presence has made a huge difference to individual players.

Let us circle back to the reason why Mugdha was brought into the Indian set-up in the first place.

India’s ODI and Test captain Mithali Raj was the first to raise her voice in favour of having a mental health conditioning coach with her side. Raj felt that having such a person would be hugely beneficial especially during the World Cup.

India had made it to the final of the 2017 50-over World Cup in England and then in 2020 finished runner-up to host Australia in the T20 World Cup. The T20 World Cup final in 2020 was particularly massive because around 85,000 people turned up at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) on International Women’s Day. That was the last match to be played in front of massive crowds before the Covid-19 pandemic hit.

Raj felt then that the presence of a professional would help the side to deal with the pressure of big matches.

"I think every individual has their own way of absorbing pressure, coming out and playing their best cricket. Having a sports psychologist traveling with the team this time around helps. She has one-on-one sessions with the players to give them more time to understand how to deal with their pressures and find ways that they can absorb and play their best cricket,” said Raj about the appointment.

The biggest talking point currently in the world of sport centres around the mental health of elite athletes. Indian athletes have come out and spoken about the various challenges they have faced over the years. But since last year the push to look at the mental health of the athletes has gone up that much more because of the uncertainty surrounding Covid-19.

Mental health practitioners have thus been in much demand amongst sportspersons.

"In today's time, it is even more important and helpful to have them around travelling with the team with longer durations of quarantines and bio-bubbles. Unlike before where we get into the World Cup directly, we have a series where the tour is extended for two months. It does help to have a one-on-one session with them because you see things in a very different perspective and that clearly helps you understand your own self to find your own ways. Everyone has different ways of dealing with pressures and quarantine times, to have somebody address those issues is always helpful - a more professional support," added Raj.

That’s how the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) zeroed in on Mugdha, who came recommended because she has worked with a number of athletes across disciplines. She spent quite a bit of time in the lead-up and during the Tokyo Olympic Games last year working with a number of athletes.

An acclaimed sportsperson herself, Mugdha is also the recipient of the prestigious Chhatrapati Award, the highest Maharashtra state-level award for excellence in sports, in the year 1994-95. Mugdha now runs a practice called Mind Sports, apart from consulting with a number of athletes.

"Over a period of time, even players have realised that the mental aspect of the game has become a very important part of it. Players do carry a bit of emotional baggage with them when they are approaching these big games. It is very important that we address this emotional baggage as a professional and we speak to the players accordingly,” said Mugdha in a video put out by the BCCI.

Mugdha specialises in dealing with players’ concerns on an individual basis. "I try and understand what is the different emotional baggage that every player is carrying with them. First of all, it is important to understand what is going on in their minds. The thought process is very important to understand and once I gather the kind of thought process they are into (either into their training or into their matches), then I start my individual work with every athlete."

At least one player has publicly come out and spoken about the impact Mugdha had on her game. That player was India’s ODI vice-captain and T20I captain Harmanpreet Kaur.

For the last few months Kaur had been struggling for form with some former players even putting her on notice for the poor returns.  Kaur’s scores in the lead-up to the World Cup were 10, 10 and 13 in the first three ODIs against New Zealand in the bilateral series at Queenstown. She was dropped for the fourth ODI, before she showed sparks of her form with a 66-ball 63 in the fifth and final ODI. Kaur then followed it up with a 104 off 114 balls in the warm-up match against South Africa before the World Cup.

"Mugdha ma'am is travelling with us and she has been of a lot of help, especially in the last four games which we played against New Zealand where my performance was not good and even, I was going into a shell because the World Cup was coming," Kaur said during a virtual press conference.

"After I spoke to her I felt I was looking for that. I had things in my mind but I was not aware of it because of a lot of pressure but after talking to her I got the solutions. I got clear ideas after talking to her, those things helped during the last two-three games. I'm sure the team is also benefiting from her because I can see she's continuously talking to all the players, which is very important and that will help us," Kaur added.

Even India head coach Ramesh Powar acknowledged the impact that Mugdha has had on the side.

"As a head coach, I wanted that help (of having a sports psychologist) because it's a high-pressure tournament and looking at our history, I wanted players to be at ease when they play this kind of high-pressure tournament (like the World Cup). She's (Mugdha) been with us from England; it's been almost or more than six months and in person, for the first time she's travelling with us and it is helping us a lot," said Powar in a pre-match virtual press conference.

In the very first game of the World Cup against Pakistan, India was struggling at 114 for six when Pooja Vastrakar and Sneh Rana came together to revive the innings. Powar put down this revival to the work put in by Mugdha. "If you remember how we used to react to collapses, I think the way Pooja and Rana addressed that collapse, it is a part of mindset and that's what she (Mugdha) works on. Moving forward, I hope it will help us get the right results and the mindsets."

Not just Kaur, even other players like Vastrakar, Rana, captain Raj and Yastika Bhatia have also lauded the support received from Mugdha.

Mugdha herself explained how athletes across the board face similar sets of challenges in their respective disciplines.

"There is a little bit of fear of failure that is attached. There is the pressure of expectations that is attached," said Mugdha. According to her she helps tackle these concerns in one-on-one sessions.  Mugdha’s approach includes looking at players’ strengths rather than their weaknesses in fun sessions. This she believes helps them perform better at the highest level.

At the end of the day however the impact of Mugdha’s work can only be assessed completely if individual performers contribute to the larger team cause. Thus far that appears to be a bit far fetched with the team barely managing to avoid choppy waters.