India head into Chennai Take a look at with an eye fixed on 2025 Girls's ODI World Cup

India captain Harmanpreet Kaur believes enjoying in Chennai is a “nice alternative” for the facet to get used to the situations, given it may very well be one of many venues for the Girls’s ODI World Cup subsequent 12 months.

India’s ladies’s workforce final performed on the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chepauk in a Quadrangular sequence in 2007. They final performed a ladies’s Take a look at right here in 1976, and the bottom hasn’t hosted any ladies’s T20Is but. Because the finish of 2022, all ladies’s internationals in India have both been in Navi Mumbai or Mumbai, until the ODI-leg of the South Africa sequence was hosted in Bengaluru final week. Following the one-off Take a look at towards South Africa beginning on Friday in Chennai, India may also be enjoying three T20Is towards them on the similar venue.

“As a workforce, it is an important alternative for us,” Harmanpreet mentioned on the eve of the Take a look at. “We’re getting used to house situations… although they’re house situations, we do not have a lot expertise right here. However I feel this sequence will certainly give us quite a lot of confidence to see how the wicket goes to behave and what combos we are able to search for [for the World Cup]. Earlier than the World Cup, with [about] one 12 months left, I feel as a workforce we’re taking this chance with each arms each time we’re enjoying house sequence. It is an important alternative to see how the wickets are and the way we are able to enhance our abilities.”

This will likely be India’s third Take a look at in seven months. They performed back-to-back Checks towards England and Australia in December 2023, posting large wins in each matches. Harmanpreet says enjoying these two matches has helped the facet do away with “overthinking” whereas enjoying in a format.

“Within the lengthy format you need to be there [in the middle] for 4 days. However for those who assume like that as a participant you possibly can overthink. The final time [we played a Test] we solely thought of profitable the classes and that actually helped us. This time additionally we are going to deal with every session. One of the best factor about Take a look at cricket is you will have time to return again. For those who lose one session, you at all times have time to [make up for] issues.

“That is the important thing level which our assist employees instructed us: ‘simply deal with every session and for those who can [break it] down to 2 to two-and-a-half hours, take into consideration how you are going to carry out as a participant’. I feel that actually helps, [rather] than considering that it is a 100 overs [roughly per day] sport which makes you overthink. These little factors actually helped us win the final two Checks and we simply wish to proceed [to apply] these.”

India will likely be counting on head coach Amol Muzumdar’s red-ball expertise heading into the Take a look at, Harmanpreet mentioned. Muzumdar, who performed 171 first-class matches in a 20-year-long profession, has additionally performed two red-ball matches at Chepauk.

“I did not have a lot expertise in Take a look at cricket after I bought to captain these two Checks,” Harmanpreet mentioned. “Amol sir assist me. He has performed lot of Take a look at [red-ball] cricket and he has quite a lot of expertise. Along with his expertise, he has helped me with issues like learn how to take choices on the sector. I do have a little bit of an thought now.

“We do not have a lot thought about how Chennai wicket goes to play. We have now solely seen when the boys had been enjoying however ladies’s cricket is completely completely different… the tempo, the best way we bowl and bat, I feel we’ll know that solely as soon as we take the sector tomorrow, see how the pitch behaves and take choices. The skilled assist employees are undoubtedly going to assist us.”