Five young stars ready to impress at Women's World Cup

Pratika Rawal (India)

Matches 14, Runs 703, Batting average 54.07, Highest Score 154

Indian cricket’s latest batting sensation made her international debut just last year in December, and hasn’t looked back since, quickly replacing Shafali Verma to become Smriti Mandhana’s partner at the top of the order.

Matching her solid footwork with classical strokeplay, Rawal is capable of sending the ball to any corner of the ground, and is adept at both defensive and attacking play.

This quality has won her high praise from the veteran Mandhana, who described Rawal as a calm batter whose batting style is perfect for the ODI format.

Rawal will look to build on her prolific start, which has seen her smash five fifties and a century over 14 ODI innings, at India’s home World Cup.

While the global stage will be a challenge for the psychology student, Rawal is no stranger to pushing herself in order to obtain optimum results, as she showed when she shifted from her home side Delhi to Railways, to play with more established India players in order to improve her cricket.

Georgia Voll (Australia)

Matches 3, Runs 173, Batting average 86.5, HS 101

Months into her breakout debut season with Australia, Georgia Voll was handed a central contract with the national side.

Voll got an opportunity in Australia’s top-order owing to an injury to Alyssa Healy during the Women’s Big Bash League last year, and made the most of her outing against India. In the three ODI series, she smashed 173 runs at a strike rate of 108.80 and also scored a quickfire century in just her second game.

After making a mark in the ODIs, Voll has continued to impress in other formats as well, including the T20Is where she has scored 210 runs at a positive strike-rate of 144.82. Given her early successes, she also got an opportunity to play in the Women’s Premier League in India, and grabbed the attention with her sublime strokeplay and powerplay, hitting 154 runs at a strike-rate closing in on 170.

This experience in the sub-continent could prove crucial as Voll readies herself for the World Cup challenge in the coming weeks.

Lauren Filer (England)

19 matches, 29 wickets, Bowling average 23.82, BBI 3/10

Lauren Filer amps up the pace quotient in the England lineup by a couple of notches, as she showed quite recently during their T20I win over India at The Oval in July.

In the third T20I of the series, the pacer delivered the fastest recorded over in women’s cricket, and stated after the game that she had the magical 80 mph mark on her radar.

Filer’s added pace can be of immense importance on the wickets in India and Sri Lanka.

While the bounce on these wickets won’t be as much as one generally sees in Australia or South Africa, Filer’s added speed lessens the reaction time for batters and can induce mistakes while her pace can lift the ball further than the opponent anticipates.

Annerie Dercksen (South Africa)

11 matches, 399 runs, 10 wickets, Batting average 39.90, Bowling average 24.30, HS 104

South Africa’s impressive all-round hope has good numbers in the ODI format, and has already won the ICC Women’s Emerging Player of the Year for 2024.

Her ability to pick up wickets at key stages and score runs lower down the order (an average of 61 with a strike-rate close to 120 at No.6) will no doubt be a crucial aspect for South Africa in their Cricket World Cup campaign.

She’s rated highly in the Proteas camp, as evidenced from batting coach Baakier Abrahams’ endorsement of her abilities to transfer the skills practiced in the nets onto the pitch with ease.

A T20I regular from 2023, she made her ODI debut only in 2024, and has become a key cog in the South Africa limited overs setup in no time. Along with Marizanne Kapp and Nadine de Klerk, the young star’s all-round abilities will play a big role in South Africa’s upcoming Cricket World Cup campaign.

Rabeya Khan (Bangladesh)

24 matches, 26 wickets, Bowling average 28.38, BBI 3/29

Rabeya Khan made her T20I debut way back in 2019, but took some years to break into the ODI setup, playing her first game in the format in December 2022. Her bowling has improved over the years, as evidenced by her six scalps during the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup Qualifier 2025 in Pakistan.

She was the star performer during their close win against Ireland, picking up 3/39 in the first innings. This result proved to be decisive as Bangladesh qualified on the basis of a superior net run rate as compared to West Indies.

Rabeya can hold her own against big sides, as she displayed during her 3/23 against India in a T20I last year, and is not concerned by the prospect of bowling against big names.

The conditions in India and Sri Lanka will likely assist her leg-breaks, and the youngster can be destructive when operating with a senior pro like Fahima Khatun.