A lookback on Jhulan Goswami's glittery career in cricket

Jhulan Nishit Goswami was born on 25th November 1982, in Nadia Bengal. She was known as one of the fastest bowlers in the women’s game and found her way into the record books when she once clocked a speed of 120.8 kilometers per hour (km/h) which is also 75.1 miles per hour (mph).

Early Days
Jhulan hails from a middle-class family in Chakdaha, West Bengal. She was initially a football fan before she took up cricket at a very young age of 15 closely following the 1992 Cricket World Cup and watching the former Australian batter Belinda Clark in the 1997 Women’s Cricket World Cup fueled her love and passion for the game. She moved to Kolkata in search of better training facilities.

Jhulan Goswami’s Legendary Stint at the International Level

ODIs:
She made her international debut on 6th January 2002 in an ODI against England at the tender age of 19. She ended her career as the leading wicket-taker (255 wickets in 203 innings) at a strike rate of 39.2 in Women’s ODIs. Her tally of wickets includes 7 four-wicket hauls and a couple of five-wicket hauls in the format. Her career-best spell with the ball in the format came on 5th July 2011 when she returned with exceptional match figures of 10-1-31-6 in her spell against England at the John Walker’s Ground, Southgate. It is also the joint-best figure as a captain in the ODI format.

She holds the record for most wickets taken as LBW (56), the most wickets taken as bowled (95) in the form of a dismissal, the most wickets taken as caught behind (40) in the form of a dismissal and with that all, also holds the record for the most number of balls bowled (10,005 balls).

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Apart from her exploits with the ball, she has also scored 1,228 runs in 121 innings, including one half-century with the bat.

Test:
She made her debut in the red-ball format on 14th January 2002. Her tally of wickets in the format includes 3 five-wicket hauls and one 10-wicket haul. Her best performance with the ball in the format came against England in August 2006 when she returned with match figures of 49.2-25-78-10 in her game-changing spell. She also finished as the 3rd highest wicket-taker for India in the red-ball format with 44 wickets at an impressive average of 17.36 and an economy of 2.02 in 21 innings.

At 23 Years and 277 Days, against England on 29th August 2006 at Taunton, she became the youngest player to take a 10-wicket haul in the red-ball format. Here, she holds the record for the most number of wickets taken as LBW (18) in the red-ball format and has the 2nd longest career (19 Years and 262 Days) in the red-ball format.

T20Is
She made her T20I debut on 5th August 2006 against England and picked up 56 wickets at an average of 21.94 and an economy of 5.45 in 67 innings. Her tally of wickets includes one five-wicket haul (3.5-1-11-5), against Australia. A handy lower-order batter, she also scored 405 runs in 46 innings with the bat for her side in the format.

Jhulan announced her retirement from international cricket on 25th September 2022.

Jhulan Goswami’s Accolades, Coaching, and Mentor Stints

Her heroics in the 2006 tour of England, where India won a Test series, including their first win against England, a fifty, the famous 10-fer, all contributed to her recognition at an awards event in Mumbai, and fittingly went on to win the ICC Women’s Player of the Year in 2007. What made the ICC honour even more significant was the fact that no Indian male player won an individual award that year.

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She also received the Arjuna Award in the Year 2010, and she also received the Padma Shri Award in the year 2012. After her retirement from international cricket, she donned the hat of a bowling coach and a mentor for Mumbai Indians in the Women’s Premier League (WPL). The Harmanpreet Kaur-led side was crowned as the inaugural champions of the tournament. The following season, they again qualified for the knockouts, however, ended up on the losing side against the Royal Challengers Bengaluru led by skipper Smriti Mandhana by 5 runs in the Eliminator.

Jhulan has also had a stint in the overseas franchise league – appointed as the mentor for the Trinbago Knight Riders (TKR) in the 2024 Women’s Caribbean Premier League (WCPL), the 3rd edition of the tournament. However, they ended up as the runners-up of the tournament courtesy of a four-wicket defeat against the Barbados Royals.