Women's World Cup Diary

It was terrific to see Thirush Kamini become the first Indian woman to hit a hundred in a World Cup, when she reached three figures in the opening game against West Indies. There was no better way for the home side to kick off the tournament, with plenty of headline grabbing performances.

Kamini, a 22-year-old left hander from Chennai, didn't always show the greatest propensity for running between the wickets - resulting in a couple of hairy moments at times - but her range of strokeplay meant she didn't always need to be running. Her century validated her recall to the side, more than two years after her last ODI, while fast bowler Jhulan Goswami lit up the late afternoon with a series of blistering boundaries. Most of us in the commentary box questioned the wisdom of promoting Goswami up the order ahead of captain Mithali Raj, who has a superior strike rate, but she proved us wrong. Goswami then opened the bowling with a superb display of swing and seam, moving the ball both ways, and was backed up well by the experienced Amita Sharma.

We were treated to a 'Dottin Special,' which had Sanjay Manjrekar purring, as the Bajan batter showed off her power hitting during an aggressive 21-minute innings, when she crashed the ball well beyond the boundary rope four times on route to 39 off 16 balls. If only Dottin could have batted for a longer period, she could have put a serious innings together to genuinely worry India. For the host nation, a 105-run win, coupled with the landmark hundred, was a brilliant way for the tournament to get underway and for the public to get engaged.

Until you walk right up to the gates of the Cricket Club of India, you would have no idea that the ICC Women's World Cup was taking place in Mumbai. There's no event branding or advertising in the Colaba district of the city where the teams are staying, or along Marine Drive, which sweeps along the seafront just yards from the charming Brabourne stadium. Upon arrival in Sri Lanka for the recent ICC World T20 you could not fail to realise a major sporting event was taking place. There are none of the life size cardboard cut-outs of players that adorned roundabouts in Colombo and Galle, and lined the arrivals hall of Colombo airport.

The budget for this tournament presumably doesn't stretch that far, which highlights the benefit to the women of having their World T20 staged alongside the men's event and being able to piggyback off the marketing. The most glaring advert that a match is taking place will be when the floodlights are switched on for the opening day-nighter between India and West Indies, hopefully tempting a few more curious locals to take advantage of the free entry to support their team at the ground that is deliciously tucked in amongst tree lined streets and residential flats.