Shafali Verma 2.0: How India opener has taken her T20 batting up a notch by showing a willingness to evolve her power-hitting game

“My father reminded me of the workouts and drills from my childhood, and helped me to do the same. When I started, we had these knocking drills – where I play on-drive, straight drive and that’s what I worked on. These are my strengths and sometimes you need to work on them to remember how good you are at them,” Shafali told The Indian Express last January. And for the rest of the year, she drilled it into her psyche that driving the ball along the ground and rotating the strike is as important to make a comeback. Hitting sixes was never Shafali’s problem; building innings of substantial volumes was.

Shafali Verma’s singles taken during the three half centuries she hit against Sri Lanka (2nd, 3rd and 4th T20I in that order). (Wagon wheel courtesy BCCI match center)

“Cricket always teaches you things, it’s important to accept weaknesses. That’s the only way you can improve,” Shafali said after the second match. That night in Visakhapatnam was a good example of the changes she has incorporated into her game. She quipped that in the past, if the ball was not coming onto the bat early in her innings, she just tried to hit her way out of trouble, but here she took her time. She’d reveal later that she was constantly talking to herself, reminding to keep the ball along the ground and shun the aerial shots before she got a hang of the conditions. At the end of the fourth over of the innings, she was batting on 10 off 10 balls with just one boundary – a supremely sedate start by her standards – while Jemimah Rodrigues took on the role of aggressor in what was bound to be a relatively easy run-chase. But once she got her eye in, Shafali was able to toy with the Sri Lankan bowling attack.

“I felt like it was my day, and when in good touch, I need to finish off matches. But my main aim was to execute my plans. In the beginning, the ball was holding up a lot, so I was trying to get going with singles at that point. After that, the ball started coming into the bat and was in my range. Then I started feeling comfortable. Cricket keeps giving these lessons, I am thriving on that experience and learning every day,” she’d say in the press conference.

In the third T20I too, she’d start the innings with three dot balls as Sri Lanka went with spin to her early on instead of pace, hoping to draw out an early error. But she teed off earlier this time around in Thiruvananthapuram, smashing Malsha Shehani for 6, 4, 4 – two of those coming through the offside down the ground.

Across her three half-centuries, a standout feature in Shafali’s batting was the singles she took in the region between deep cover to long on arc. During the 69* in the 2nd T20I, 12 runs came in that sector, going up to 14 in each of the next two knocks of 79. As she collected the player of the series of award too, the fact that she got out cheaply in two matches was on top of her mind. “The way I got out today and in the first match, I will try to avoid these mistakes. My focus is on playing longer innings,” she said. You only had to watch her walk back to the pavilion after being dismissed for 79 in the fourth match, when a century and more was there for the taking. There was anger in her strides, a sense of disappointment in gently tapping one back to the bowler. Shafali 2.0 isn’t just see-ball-hit-ball. The time away from the Indian team has brought about a hunger for runs, but without taking away the X-Factor completely.