Jhulan Goswami is one of the youngest members of this Indian squad. Although not very strongly built, she bowls with a smooth, easy run up and has formed a strong new-ball partnership with Amita Sharma. Goswami's strength lies in the fact that she generates movement off the pitch when she lands the ball on the seam and is now the fastest female bowler in the world, bowling at 120kph. Such pace seemed unlikely when she used to play tennis ball cricket with the lads as a young teen. "They asked me to stop bowling at them and just go and bat. It was then that I made up my mind to bowl fast." That she did - and she's been helped by Dennis Lillee at the MRF pace academy in Chennai.

She also has the ability to get the ball to bounce an extra bit every now and then and this surprises the best of batsmen. She plays for Air India with Mithali Raj and was named vice-captain for India's tour of England in 2006, during which she helped India to the Test series win, including their first victory against England, making a fifty as nightwatchman in the first Test at Leicester and taking her career-best match figures of 10 for 78 - 5 for 33 and 5 for 45 - in the second Test at Taunton. Such feats made her the player of the series and also recognition at the Castrol Awards in Mumbai in September, where she received a Special Award. Further to that, she won the ICC Women's Player of Year in 2007 - a year no Indian male player bagged any individual award.

Goswami had a good outing at the Quadrangular tournament in Chennai in February-March 2007 taking 11 wickets at 20.99 from seven games. After that haul she needed only four more to become the fourth woman to reach 100 wickets in ODIs and she got to the landmark in May 2007 at the Asia Cup in 2008.

She is now the second highest Indian women's wicket-taker behind Neetu David. Goswami was part of the Asia squad for the Afro-Asia tournament in India in June 2007. In October 2008 Goswami replaced Mithali Raj as the Indian captain for the tour of Australia.

Cricinfo Staff (October 7, 2008)

ICC Women's Player of the Year 2007

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Aug 30, 2008 Jhulan Goswami went wicketless in her seven overs © Getty Images

May 6, 2008 Jhulan Goswami and Salma Khatun at the toss © Tiger Cricket

May 2, 2008 Jhulan Goswami took 4 for 18 © TigerCricket.com

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