By Tyler Lewis
While many were occupied with Tik Tok, baking and arts and crafts in Melbourne’s 2020 lockdown, Hasrat Gill was honing in on a craft of her own – the art of leg-spin bowling.
On the front foot-path of her Clyde home, Gill mapped out the dimensions of a cricket pitch with the sole intention of developing her off-spin.
Little did the Endeavour Hills junior know that those neatly placed cones would be the first step in a swift rise through the Victorian cricket ranks.
“It just happened during lockdown in 2020 I guess, I came across bowling a variation of my off-spin, I wanted something unique,” she recalled.
“I tried a leggie and it just felt so much more natural to me and it came along, the initial thought was to have it as a variation.
“But it got to the point where if I was going to bowl offies and leggies, I could only be half as good at both or be really good at one.
“I ultimately decided to bowl leggies because it came more naturally to me.
“There was nothing to do in lockdown, so it was all I was doing.”
In the season after her adjustment, the then 14-year-old claimed 21 wickets at an average of just 12 for Melbourne’s Second XI.
The summer that followed – 2021/22 – was then the perfect summer for Gill, as she burst into Melbourne’s First XI, topped the competition for wickets (26 wickets at 11.92) and also jagged a hat-trick.
By claiming wickets in 13 of her 14 appearances for the eventual premiership side, the thorough 16-year-old earned call ups to Victorian and Melbourne Star squads to rub shoulders with cricketers she grew up idolising.
“It can be quite surreal, I remember I got called up to have a bowl to the Vic girls and I was bowling to Ellyse Perry… she has been my idol since I was 11 or 12,” she said.
“It can be a bit of a pinch-yourself moment and with the Stars right now, we’ve got the likes of Jemimah Rodrigues, Lauren Winfield-Hill and Annabel Sutherland, they’re all brilliant.
“It is pretty surreal, but when I am around them I try to learn, absorb and get the most of every situation and opportunity I get.
“I am asking them questions, talking to them about their game and how they went about their cricket at my age, what they’ve done to get to the top level and then performed so consistently.
“I am just trying to be a sponge and absorb everything they do.”
And while fraternising with her heroes initially star-struck the ambitious Gill, she still understands the task she is there to accomplish.
“Well… you want to get them out, that’s your main goal,” she revealed of her thoughts at the top of her mark to Perry and co.
“It’s sort of just trying to work out different things, play around with them, work out how they react to different balls and see how they try to execute their skills.
“They are my heroes and they are brilliant players, but at the end of the day I am the bowler, they’re the batter and they have to make a mistake.
“So for me, it’s my job to get the ball to the other end and let the ball do the talking.”
With her leg-spin developing swiftly, Gill is looking to further deviations as well as meticulously analysing her opponents.
“I have got a few variations, I have the normal leg-spinner, I have a wrong-un, a slider and I also play around with the grip and bowl from different parts of the crease – I like to play around with those subtle variations,” she said.
“I look at different girls and how they go about their work… first of all, I like to look at how they stand and judging where their strengths and weaknesses may potentially be.
“I also look for other things, their grip on the bat and how that allows them to access different areas, the bat speed, the hand speed, those factors I look for as well.
“I like to do my analysis pre-game as well, so I know who I am going to be up against.”
With the foundations in place, Gill is hopeful that the next step transpires as a result of improvement in one area in particular.
“I have looked at a few things in terms of my execution,” she said.
“I have the skill-set and that part of my game is set, I feel I am good enough to match the girls I come up against, it’s just the execution part of it.
“You know, playing the right shot at the right time… identifying what the game requires at that particular time.
“I guess with bowling, knowing what trick to pull out at what time… if a batter is going hard at me, what’s my field look like, what am I going to bowl.”
The young gun is yet to debut for the Melbourne Stars, but has been named in each of the recent 13-person squads.
