Pakistan’s top-order women batter Bismah Maroof has confirmed her availability for the ICC Women’s World Cup 2022 and will participate in warm-up matches to be held in Karachi as part of the side’s selection and preparation for the New Zealand event that will take place from 4 March to 3 April 2022.
Bismah, who has played 108 ODIs and T20Is each in a career that started in 2006, commenced her maternity leave in December 2020 and gave birth to a baby girl in August 2021. Bismah has already been re-integrated into cricketing activities and has resumed fitness sessions as part of her post-childbirth rehabilitation at the National High Per-formance Centre. She will soon commence net prac-tice after overcoming a thumb injury.
Bismah Maroof: “The past few months have been the best of my life. Becoming a mother and spending time with my daughter has given me im-mense pleasure, but it is now time to return to my passion of representing Pakistan at an international stage.
“The maternity leave helped me realise the sig-nificance of navigating the balance of raising a child and maintaining my professional cricketing career as I missed being on the field each time I saw the girls in action. But thanks to the PCB Parental Support Policy.—Agencies
