Meet Salonee Dangore - from track and field to playing in the Women's Caribbean Premier League

New Delhi, Sep 13 (IANS) Securing a spot in an overseas T20 league is a rare feat for an uncapped player, particularly for someone who’s yet to feature in their own country’s premier franchise T20 competition.

When such selections happen, they highlight a player’s exceptional potential and mark a significant leap in their professional trajectory. Salonee Dangore’s ongoing debut stint in the ongoing Women’s Caribbean Premier League (WCPL) has been just that.

The little-known leg-spinner, being the third player from India to play the WCPL this year after Shreyanka Patil and Shikha Pandey, brought a lot of attention and intrigue in equal measure. Though Salonee is yet to register herself in wicket-taking charts for the Trinbago Knight Riders, she’s relishing the chance of being in the Caribbean and knowing more about it.

“It's going really well. I'm feeling really good here. Honestly, I was a little nervous. But I converted it into excitement and it felt really good as soon as I went to the Caribbean. Now it's going really well. We talk a lot with local Caribbean players. We get to know their stories, culture and it feels really good,” said Salonee in a conversation with IANS, facilitated by FanCode, the official broadcaster of the WCPL.

She’s also found good guidance from team mentor, legendary India fast bowler Jhulan Goswami and being in TKR’s playing eleven with Shikha and Jess Jonassen, the players she closely observed as a net bowler stint with Delhi Capitals in the Women’s Premier League (WPL).

“Jhulan di is also here and gives us a lot of inputs whenever we have practice sessions. Her experiences and Shikha di's experience has helped a lot. It feels amazingly good to be playing alongside them. In 2 years for DC as a net bowler, I had a lot of interactions with Shikha and Jess.

“Now I'm playing with them in the same eleven, so it feels really good. They take care of me and we talk a lot about cricket, so it feels really good. The learnings I took from DC was in tactical parts and their work ethics and seeing the things that make them legends of the games. I got to see and learn a lot from that stint.”

“When there were games in WPL, we used to sit in the room and discuss about the matches – like if I was playing, how I could have done things in this or that way. Same thing happened when I played my first match here.”

“After a game was over, they gave me inputs on what I could have done and the things I can work on. So I applied all of that in the nets and that played a very important role in my time around them,” she elaborated.

The importance of power hitting in T20s during WPL gave Salonee a realisation about working hard on her batting skills. “I started working on that and I have come here, so I want to bring the impact of my power hitting skills to the team.”

In Guyana, where the pitches are expected to be slow and turning, Dangore sees an opportunity to make a mark. “That favours my bowling style. I have also thought that I want to be amongst the top wicket takers and somehow help my team to win the title,” she said.

Growing up in Indore, Salonee was immersed in athletics, competing in the 100m and 200m sprints and long jump. Her father works as a Telecom District Manager with BSNL, while her mother, Vibha, who had a passion for basketball, played a pivotal role in her sporting journey, as her won sporting ambitions never took off.

Until 2015, Salonee had little interest in cricket and did not even know what leg-spin was till her mother’s coach, Jose Chacko, a Sports and Youth Welfare Officer in Bhopal, suggested that she might find better prospects in cricket than athletics. At 16, Salonee made the switch from athletics to cricket, thus paving the way for a remarkable journey.

“My mother’s coach said she is very active and if you put her in cricket, she will pick up the game quickly. So my mom thought let's switch her to cricket and so that's how it started,” she recalls.

When Salonee got the call for WCPL selection, it came as pleasant surprise to her family. “Everyone was very happy because there was no hope and this opportunity came out of nowhere. My mother was very happy and a little emotional on hearing this,” recalls Salonee.

She was first enrolled at academy of former Ranji Trophy player Sunil Lahore, who spotted her potential to be a leg-spinner instead of a medium pacer. Further refining of her bowling came at the Ramesh Bhatia Cricket Foundation (RBCF), under coaches Sanjay Choubey and Himanshu Vairagi.

“In the beginning I wanted to become a medium pacer. But my coach told me to become a leg spinner. Then I joined RBCF academy and worked hard on my leg-spin and that's how it started.”

In the beginning, Salonee used to watch the legendary Shane Warne’s videos in slow motion, so that she could copy his action. But Salonee considers herself very fortunate on getting guidance from former India spinner Narendra Hirwani for the last three years.

“I first met him three years ago because I used to play at MPCA, where he had come as a spin coach. So he saw my bowling and that's how we interacted. He has not only worked on my skills, but also worked on my mindset a lot. So I can say that I feel more confident while bowling and all these changes have happened because of him,” she said.

In search of better opportunities after not getting much game time in Madhya Pradesh in U16, U19 and senior levels, Salonee moved to Chhattisgarh before the 2024-25 domestic season (though she will be turning out for a new team in the upcoming season).

Getting consistent game time with bat and ball there for Chhattisgarh meant she caught the attention of eagle-eyed WPL scouts and was then called upon as a net bowler for DC. It won’t come as a surprise if the DC net bowling stint was a catalyst to Salonee getting WCPL deal.

“It has been a very good exposure because when you come to another country and play with top players, you get a lot of learnings in terms of how much advancements have happened in the game and how to prepare for matching up to that level.”

“So it has been a very good experience so far. It has been a very good exposure because when you come to another country and play with top players, you get a lot of learnings in terms of how much advancements have happened in the game and how to prepare for matching up to that level,” she said.

Before coming to the Caribbean, Salonee had wise words of advice from Hirwani. “He said ‘You need to play fearless cricket and we don't want to prove anything. You are already there. Just express yourself freely while playing and enjoy’.”

While Salonee is itching to get herself registered in WCPL wicket-takers list, she draws a lot of inspiration from Shreyanka. Back in 2023, Shreyanka was uncapped when signed by Guyana Amazon Warriors for WCPL and became the leading wicket-taker with nine wickets in five games.

From there, she became the leading wicket-taker in RCB’s WPL 2024 win and played for India in both white-ball formats. “Yes I saw her matches at that time. She hadn’t represented India by then and because of her WCPL performance, she represented India. So to a very large extent, even I have some similar expectations. So this WCPL is a stepping stone towards my ultimate dream,” concluded Salonee.

--IANS

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