Indian batter Jemimah Rodrigues has seen many ups and downs in the last couple of years of her career and she was benched during the ODI and the T20I series in England last year.
In Thursday's T20I against Sri Lanka Rodrigues played a crucial role in India's victory over the hosts by 34 runs. She played the vital knock of unbeaten 36 when four important betters were sent back by Sri Lankan bowlers.
"My height is the same but mental thing has changed a lot. In the last few years, from the last Sri Lanka tour, the journey hasn't been very smooth and there have been a lot of ups and downs," Rodrigues said after her player-of-the-match performance.
Speaking in the post-match interview, Rodrigues also mentioned talking to India captain Rohit Sharma and Rishabh Pant and how they helped her after she was dropped from the Indian women's team last year.
"I also had the opportunity in the last few months to talk with cricketers like Rohit Sharma and Rishabh Pant and others. They actually told that these moments define you and prepare you for something greater that's coming. If you look at it [in a] negative way it is not going to help. But these are the moments that define you as a cricketer. I was blessed to speak to them and some of our teammates," she added.
"I have become calmer in this time and have understood the value of having good relationships... my family who have been there. The last few months have helped me understand even my game better. This is the cricketer's life - nobody's life is smooth and what I am learning is to get better every time," she said.
Talking about the match, Radha Yadav's fiery bowling was backed by Jemimah Rodrigues's unbeaten 36 runs as the visitors scored a 34-run win over the Sri Lanka team at the match played at Rangiri Dambulla International Stadium, Dambulla.
It was a poor day for Sri Lanka's batting unit as they could not do much with the bat on a difficult surface. Earlier, Sri Lanka bowlers restricted India to 138/6 in 20 overs. With this win, India have taken lead in the three-match T20I series.
For Sri Lanka, Kavisha Dilhari smashed unbeaten 46 runs and was the top scorer. For India, Radha Yadav bagged crucial two wickets while Pooja Vastrakar, Shafali Verma and Deepti Sharma scalped one wicket each.
( With inputs from ANI )
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