Kiran Navgire

Some Lesser Known Facts About Kiran Navgire

• Kiran Navgire is an Indian cricketer. She played for UP Warriorz Women in the Women’s Premier League’s (WPL) inaugural season.

• She came from humble beginnings and used to assist her father at the family farm in her village. ^[5]The Times of India

• Navgire was more interested in athletics, kho-kho, and kabaddi competitions as a child.

• She actively participated in different athletics competitions and represented her school in the district-level, state-level and national-level matches. According to some reports she has won around 100 medals in different competitions.

• In 2008, Kiran lost in the state-level javelin throw competition; however, she succeeded to win the state-level competition the very next year. In 2010, she was selected for national-level competitions and continued playing at the national level between 2010 and 2011.

• She won a gold medal in the javelin throw competition at the 2011-2012 inter-varsity games.

• She idolized MS Dhoni as she grew up and copied his batting style; Virender Sehwag and Chris Gayle also inspired her. In an interview, she revealed that she followed the examples of Cristiano Ronaldo and Usain Bolt when she was an athlete.

• In 2016, Gulzar Sheikh, who later became her coach, along with the president of the Azam Sports Academy in Pune, Maharashtra noticed her during a university match held at the Azam Sports Academy. They came to know about her humble background and that she lacked professional training; impressed by her talent they offered her a chance to train at the academy without paying any fees. This put Kiran in a dilemma as she wanted to pursue a career in athletics; both the president and coach suggested choosing cricket over athletics and she switched from athletics to cricket.

• Navgire scored 429 runs in five matches at a tournament organised by the Pune District Cricket Association (PDCA) in the 2016-2017 season and impressed the selectors at the PDCA.

• On 24 December 2017, she was selected for the Maharashtra Women’s team and later debuted against the Railways Women. She was part of the Maharashtra team between 2017 and 2021; however, her opportunities were limited and she found it hard to break into the playing eleven in the star-studded team.

• In 2021, Navgire was not selected for the Maharashtra Women’s team for the 2021-2022 season. Kiran was determined to play cricket at the highest level and discovered that the Nagaland Women’s team were looking for guest players for the 2021-2022 season; she applied for it and got selected for the team.

  

• She scored 137 runs and took 11 wickets from six matches during the Women’s Senior One Day Trophy (2021-2022).

• Kiran was selected to the Nagaland Women’s team for the 2021-2022 Women’s Senior T20 Trophy; she scored a century and four half-centuries and finished the tournament as the top scorer with 525 runs from seven matches.

• On 15 April 2022, she scored 162 runs from 76 balls with a strike rate of 213.16 against the Arunachal Pradesh women’s team in the opening match of the Women’s Senior T20 Trophy (2021-2022) at the ACA Stadium, Barsapara; Kiran Navgire became the first Indian (men’s or women’s cricket) to score more than 150 runs in a T20 match.

• On 28 April 2022, she scored 56 runs from 44 balls against Kerala Women in the pre-quarter-final of the Women’s Senior T20 Trophy; however, Nagaland lost by seven wickets.

• IPL Velocity announced the signing of Kiran for the 2022 Women’s T20 Challenge on 16 May 2022. In the second match of the tournament, she scored 69 runs from 34 balls with a strike rate of 202.94 against the Trailblazers; this was the fastest half-century in the history of the tournament.

• On 28 May 2022, in the Women’s T20 Challenge finals against the Supernovas, she was dismissed on a duck by Sophie Ecclestone after she played thirteen dot balls and was heavily criticized for it.

• In August 2022, she was named to the T20 India Women’s team for the India Women’s tour of England. In September 2022, India Women played a warm-up match against the England Development Squad Women and she scored 14 runs from 10 balls.

  

• On 10 September 2022, she scored seven runs from thirteen balls against the England Women in her official debut match; she played in two matches of the series.

• On 21 September 2022, she was included in the 15-member T20 squad announced by the BCCI for the 2022 Women’s Asia Cup. ^[6]Outlook

• On 18 November 2022, she was named to the India C Women’s team for the Senior Women’s T20 Challenger Trophy (2022-2023). She scored 26 runs in three matches.

  

• Navgire played against Malaysia Women in the Women’s Asia Cup on 3 October 2022; however, she was dismissed on a duck; she played in three more matches in the competition and scored ten runs against the United Arab Emirates Women.

  

• She was named to the Nagaland Women’s team for the 2022-2023 Women’s Senior T20 Trophy and the 2022-2023 Women’s Senior One Day Trophy; she failed to emulate her performances from the previous tournaments and Nagaland was eliminated in the group stages of both the competitions.

• On 13 February 2023, she was signed by the UP Warriorz Women for the inaugural season of the Women’s Premier League.

• She debuted against Gujarat Giants in the Women’s Premier League on 5 March 2023 and scored 53 runs from 43 balls with a strike rate of 123.26.

• She batted with a sponsorless bat in the first match of the Women’s Premier League; she wrote “MSD O7” on her bat as there were some issues with her sponsor.

• She scored 155 runs from nine matches with a strike rate of 114.81 in the 2022-2023 season of the Women’s Premier League.