WPL: Issy Wong, the quintessential IPL generation cricketer

The 20-year-old England pacer is shining on a platform — the Indian Premier League — that she grew up watching

Mumbai Indians fast bowler Issy Wong. (Photo | BCCI)

CHENNAI: Issy Wong has had more than one reason to be happy in the last few days. The Mumbai Indians pacer made a mark in the opening game of the Women's Premier League, clocking 126.3 kmph (78.47 mph) against Gujarat Giants last Saturday.

On Sunday, she sat back in her hotel room, enjoying the 7-0 drubbing her favourite Premier League team — Liverpool — gave Manchester United. A few days on, she was back on the field, registering 3/10 against Delhi Capitals at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai.

The 10.25-minute long press conference from Wong after the match-winning show on Thursday sums up the 20-year-old as an athlete and a person. Competitive, unflustered by the big stage, clarity of thought about the game and tactics, witty yet realistic, and no drama whatsoever. If one had followed her over the last few years, none of this would come as a surprise.

Wong's early moment of fame came in 2019 during the now-defunct Super League in England when she solved the Rubik's Cube in 33 seconds. However, that wasn't all she did. On the field, the then 17-year-old was hovering over 70 mph and declared to the world that she wanted to break the 80 mph (130 kmph) barrier in the women's game.

Where does this confidence come from for a teenager? The easier answer is that she is from the new generation — the Indian Premier League one, to be precise. As a kid, Wong was more into football and discovered cricket later. By the time she did, she was already an ardent Liverpool fan. In cricket, Wong grew up watching the likes of Lasith Malinga, Brendon McCullum and Shane Warne owning the limelight in the IPL. That is what she wanted to become.

"Looking at those guys, you know, playing exciting cricket and thinking I want to be that, I guess, it's the kind of shift in role models for younger guys. We've grown up watching T20 cricket, exciting players. So, there's probably a bit of fearlessness with age as well," Wong had told this daily earlier.

However, you wouldn't want to mistake it for naivety. For Wong, it is about being fearless about her skills and ensuring that she is positive on the field and expresses herself. That said, all this is just one part of her as an individual. Even off the field, Wong has always been this hyper-enthusiastic bundle of energy who cannot sit idle through a day. So much so that her mother calls her a 'human hurricane'.

"Even if it's the little things like, I don't know, running up the stairs fastest when I was little, eating my dinner first. I just started playing cricket, and then I said, 'I want to be better than the next child — whether that's hitting the ball further or bowling faster," she said.

At some level, her competitive energy did not make things easy for her growing up. Wong used to 'get told off' because she was inquisitive, always asked questions, and wanted to learn and do different things. While she isn't able to pinpoint where this quality of her stems from, Wong believes that she has tamed that competitive edge over the years. Now, she tries to compete with herself and how to be better than the previous day.

She also doesn't hesitate to take a leaf out of her football team and implement it in her cricket. Her fandom is such that she was there in Paris when Liverpool lost to Real Madrid 1-0 in the Champions League final last year before flying back home, turning up for Central Sparks in a Charlotte Edwards Cup match the next evening. "For me, as a cricketer, to look at that and say, 'well, these guys (Liverpool) have sustained that level of performance for 63 games in a season'. I think that can probably be translated into cricket as well. Every day you're not going to go well, but it's how you can get those gritty results, and they all add up," she said.

Almost a month after the CL final, Wong made history when she made her England debut. The pacer was the first woman of East Asian descent to represent the country in international cricket. Her great grand uncle Donald Anderson had played cricket for Hong Kong between 1929-30. Wong didn't know all this when she got into cricket. She said as much in an interview with allovercric.com.

While there will be a rich sense of historical significance to everything Wong achieves in cricket, there is only one thing the pacer wants when she gets on the field — to make things happen. "I always have that mindset of 'I want to make things happen', especially in T20 cricket. Whether I've got the bat in hand or ball in hand or in the field, how can I make something happen for my team here? Whether that's hitting a boundary to release pressure, taking a wicket or saving runs on the field, I guess that's always trying to add value to your team."

Safe to say, she is doing it all for Mumbai Indians in the WPL — a platform she grew up watching, a stage where she belongs.