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The last frontier beckons
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Belinda Jane Clark, Australian women's cricket captain, hopes to emulate her male counterparts during the India tour
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Belinda Jane Clark: 'The media is fickle at times.'
BELINDA JANE Clark loves the adrenaline rush of cricket. And instead of just watching the men do their bit for cricketing glory on the field, she strode out of her New Castle home in Australia and joined the boys for a game of cricket. That stride past the garden gate two decades back has now evolved into a confident gait towards the batting crease.
Belinda Clark, Australian women's cricket team captain and the highest run-scorer in one day internationals for women with 4000 plus runs in her kitty was in Bangalore recently on her way to Mysore for the first two one-dayers of the seven match series against the Indian eves. And as she packed her kitbag for another criss-cross tour over the Indian sub-continent, her eyes lit up when told that her 100th one-day international will be played on Indian soil at Surat.
"Ah! The 100th match? Well I never thought about it when I first played for Australia during the 1990-91 season. Well it's been a good ride so far... some good patches and also some bad patches but overall it's been very enjoyable. And to get here in India and play in some tough conditions that favours spin is another challenge that I enjoy," says Belinda.
Being the opening batswoman she is always on her toes, scampering hard for the singles, driving with ιlan and often pulling off sharp tumbling catches in the outfield that belie her 34 summers.
"I love the game and the buzz around it. Women's cricket may be a little different from men's cricket in terms of the size of the ball or the physical attributes of the players but it is very competitive," she says. She has won two awards — `Wisden Australian Cricketer of the Year 1998' award and `Member of the Order of Australia 2000' award.
Belinda may be warm and gracious off the field but on it she is a true-blue Aussie who has to win at all costs. "Look we play for keeps, we play to win, and there is no two ways about that. That's the way we are. All Aussie athletes are clued into winning; it is something that is intrinsic to our culture. But we also enjoy the game immensely," Belinda says.
This urge to win has helped Australia win the Women's' World Cup on four occasions though in the last final, Clark's women stumbled in the final against New Zealand. However with the next World Cup at South Africa just round the corner Belinda believes that the series of games in India will be an apt prelude. "We want to win that World Cup and before that we have to win here and keep our confidence up. Our record against India is good (15 wins in 16 matches) and we have to build on that," Belinda says.
Belinda is all praise for the Australian system that promotes sport. "Back home we are part of Cricket Australia and we do share inputs with the male players. We share information and expertise at the Centre of Excellence in Brisbane. Our system based on club cricket, state cricket, age-group competitions and other tournaments helps us play better for our country. We have a base of 50,000 women cricketers in Australia and that is a quite a number to choose from," she says.
However women's cricket does have its share of woes as men's cricket, football and tennis get more TV coverage. "The media is fickle at times and they have a lot of space allocated for men's cricket, football and tennis. But Cricket Australia has been a great supporter and that helps us to pull through," she says.
K.C. VIJAYA KUMAR
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