International cricket star Smriti Mandhana on advocating women in cricket

Episode 9 of the third season of Red Bull’s Mind Set Win podcast sees global star and celebrated women’s cricket icon Smriti Mandhana sit down with Lisa Ramuschkat to discuss what it means to represent her country at an international level whilst also standing at the forefront of the rise in popularity of women’s cricket.

Growing up amongst a family of aspiring cricketers, Smriti was empowered to take up the sport from a young age -and she excelled immediately. She was selected for her state’s under-15s team aged only nine and made her international debut by eighteen.

Smriti’s career quickly went from strength to strength as a record-setter and breaker, as the first Indian woman to achieve a double-hundred in a one-day game, and scoring the fastest fifty for India, all before becoming India’s youngest captain at just twenty-two. From playing in an empty stadium, to now filling out almost 30,000-80,000 capacity stadiums, Smriti now is captain of Women’s Premier League team Royal Challengers Bangalore.

In this episode, Smriti chats openly about her passion for championing women’s sports and the privilege of her status as a role model for young girls. She opens up about carrying the weight of representing your country at the highest level of sport and how she’s learnt to channel this pressure into something that still energises and excites her.

On doing her bit to change perceptions of women in cricket

“I think seeing the both sides of the coin from playing at a place where people didn’t care about women’s cricket to playing to this sort of reception, I think I’ll take that pressure any day and play in that sort of environment because all you want is people cheering for you and wanting the team to do well and wanting the country to do well. So, yeah, I think seeing small girls coming out, turning out in huge numbers to cheering their heroes is pretty cool.

On her message to aspiring cricketers and sport enthusiasts

“If you get professional into it, never forget that you actually picked up the bat and the ball or whatever sport you did because you enjoyed doing that as a kid. And secondly, I think you have to enjoy each and everything which comes with cricket. It can be your strength session, it can be your conditioning session, it can be your practice session, but you have to enjoy each and everything which comes because the final product is what we do on the ground.”

On differentiating between right or wrong

“I just feel that sometimes there’s a right or wrong for your own self. That is only for me and I wouldn’t say that the other girl in the team will have to do the same thing to do a certain way. But then it’s really important to find out what’s right and wrong for you. Nowadays, I think because of social media, people see other things and see people and think that that’s right for them, that’s wrong for them and then they start feeling that this is the same thing for us which is I don’t really agree to that – I just feel that humans, everyone is different in their own ways and it’s really important for them to find out what’s right and wrong for their own selves.

On viewing her body as her biggest investment

“I always say the biggest investment as an athlete is our body. You don’t have to invest in any other thing, but it’s the only thing which you have to take care of the most and which you invest in like a stock, and then it gives you back the reward. The best investment for an athlete is your body. And if your body is at the 100% level that is only when you’re going to be able to perform or give the best for your team.”

On the importance of psychologists to share the mental load

“Everyone always relates a psychologist to some mental problem or something, but I just feel it’s even if you want to enhance your performance or you want to do anything, I think that’s not a… that’s not a bad option. I’ve started in the last one or two years, I do have one, and it’s really helped me.”

On appreciating criticism

“If things don’t go well, of course you do have to hear a few things which maybe won’t please you, but if you’re able to take all the congratulations and all the appreciation, I feel as a human you need to be able to take all the criticism as well. So both things don’t really affect me a lot, like appreciation or criticism.”

The full episode can be viewed on YouTube and all podcast-streaming platforms.

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