Brandon teen starts Manitoba’s first all-female cricket team
One highschool lady’s dream grew into the primary all-female cricket crew in Manitoba, because of a gaggle of like-minded youngsters from Brandon.
Mahee Patel grew up enjoying the game along with her household and determined to try to recruit ladies on the Crocus Plains Regional Secondary Faculty the place she’s a pupil.
Patel says she was pleasantly stunned by the response.
“I had no religion that greater than like three ladies would be a part of. But it surely seems a number of them did,” Patel mentioned.
On Saturday the Crocus Plains Girls’s crew, with Patel as their captain, made historical past on the Manitoba Cricket Stadium in Winnipeg’s Assiniboine Park by changing into the primary all-female crew ever to take part within the Manitoba Cricket Affiliation Excessive Faculty Jamboree.
Manitoba has greater than 60 cricket groups within the province — 54 in Winnipeg, eight in Brandon and one in Winkler — but there has by no means been an all-female crew till now.
Which means the Crocus Plains crew has no different ladies to compete towards.
WATCH | Manitoba’s 1st all-female cricket crew hits the sector:
Coach Jeanine Allers and captain Mahee Patel are a part of Manitoba’s first all-female cricket crew, with a roster of 12 gamers from Crocus Plains Regional Secondary Faculty in Brandon, Man. It’s a primary that Garvin Budhoo, president of Cricket Manitoba, mentioned was encouraging to see at this 12 months’s Manitoba Cricket Affiliation Excessive Faculty Jamboree.
Whereas the opposite groups embrace gamers with years of expertise who play in league video games. Patel and her crew have solely been enjoying for about three months.
However Patel mentioned her crew is not afraid.
“They don’t seem to be terrified of hitting the ball or getting hit by the ball,” she mentioned.
“We now have all of the gear and all the security measures taken … we’re able to go.”
Higher curiosity in cricket
Garvin Budhoo, President of Cricket Manitoba, says curiosity within the sport has exploded lately.
There have been 15 groups when he took over as president a decade in the past, he mentioned.
“We have been battling with 15 or 14 groups after which we went to twenty, after which during the last 4 years, we have simply sprung and simply ballooned on the waist and acquired to 54 this 12 months,” he mentioned, referring to groups in Winnipeg alone.
A lot of the curiosity, Budhoo suggests, is because of newcomers to the province from “South Asian nations like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan.”
“The migration has been simply phenomenal and cricket is among the sports activities are the they play. They perceive cricket. They know cricket,” he mentioned.
Lengthy-term plan for ladies
Budhoo says he hopes the brand new Crocus Plains crew will spur ladies in Manitoba to type groups.
“If these ladies can proceed enjoying and collaborating, then I’m hoping that in Winnipeg we are able to get extra ladies developing and saying ‘Yep, we wish to play. We wish to be a part of a league,'” he mentioned.
The youngsters on the brand new crew are coached by Jeanine Allers, a former participant.
Allers mentioned they practiced at the highschool indoors two days every week, after which when the climate acquired nicer, they moved outside..
“They find it irresistible up to now and everyone was tremendous serious about persevering with together with like a growth league in Brandon. So we’re hoping to get the sources and the help to start out up a full-time ladies’s league there,” she mentioned.
In the meanwhile, there’s one feminine participant in Winnipeg.
Amarpaul Kaur, 24, performs with the Royal Kings Cricket Membership.
Budhoo describes her as a “high-level” participant in Canada. She performs for groups in Manitoba, Alberta and Toronto.
Patel says individuals should not put limits on ladies and ladies with regards to cricket.
“We will do something we would like,” she mentioned.
“Lots of people assume that, oh, it is cricket, the women will not be capable of hit the ball as laborious or throw the ball as laborious as the blokes do, however we are able to we are able to positively do it if we observe,” she mentioned.
