Biography

Pooja Vastrakar is an Indian cricketer, who is a bowling all-rounder in the national womens cricket team.Reportedly, Pooja was enticed by a group of boys from her locality in Shahdol to play cricket. In an interview, she said, I was a good gully cricketer, so I urged my sister to help me get into an academy. She went around the town to find one, but came back to say that none of them trained girls. So I left thinking about it..She was good at gully cricket but was rarely given the opportunity to bat. In an interview, she said, Ek do overs hi milte hain, aur main woh ek do overs mein hi kuch na kuch kamaal kar deti thi (Id get only one or two overs but Id do something amazing in them),.She along with the children of her locality decided to use the ground facilities of one of the cricket academies nearby, which remained unused in the morning, to play cricket without worrying about breaking the windows or losing balls. This is when Pooja got introduced to her coach, Ashutosh Shrivastava.In an interview, Vastrakar stated, We used to play 4-over games. As luck would have it, on one of the days when it was my turn to bat, I hit a few sixes, one guy spotted me. He came and asked me if I was interested to join the academy and took me to Ashutosh Shrivastav, who has been my coach since then. Photo of Pooja Vastrakar playing cricket with boys in her childhood.Shrivastav took note of her natural talent and started training her at his academy, Gulmohar Cricket Academy, which was an all-boys facility.Since Vastrakar was the only girl who took training at Shrivastavs academy, all her training took place with the boys.Unfortunately, Vastrakars mother died just after Pooja joined the academy. She was only 10 years old and her mothers demise devastated her to such an extent that she stopped going to her cricket training sessions at the academy.Later, when her coach realised her absence for a prolonged duration, he approached Poojas family to check on her. Upon hearing the news about Poojas mother, he asked Poojas sisters to convince her to join back the academy, which she obliged to.Shahdol was yet to be made into a division so initially, Pooja played for the neighbouring Rewa division in Madhya Pradesh and Central Zone.