Indonesia enters the world stage

Until 2023, I could count on one finger the number of fellow Indonesian people with whom I had a conversation about cricket who was also a fellow fan of the game. I had accepted that cricket would be an interest I could freely indulge in when living in Australia, but would be restricted to online spaces when back home. Indonesia is not historically a cricketing country, and while I knew that we had national teams, I thought it was reasonable of me not to expect any Indonesian team to make any sort of mark on cricket's world stage.

The inaugural ICC U-19 Women's World Cup was hosted by South Africa in January 2023. Like the men's edition, it was a 16-team tournament, where teams from Full Member nations would qualify automatically (a total of 11, with the tragic and regrettable absence of a team representing Afghanistan) while 5 teams representing each of ICC's regions would qualify through regional pathways (though unlike the men's tournament, it was played as T20Is). Qualifying through Asia was the UAE, USA from the Americas, Scotland from Europe, Rwanda from Africa (whose rise in women's cricket had drawn a lot of deserved attention), and from East Asia-Pacific was Indonesia - wait, what?

As it turned out, Indonesia's women's cricket program was quite well-developed, at least by Associate standards (for more details, you can read my interview with the head of Indonesia's cricket association here). At the time of writing, the senior women's team is ranked 20 in T20Is which, while a symptom of the ICC's far from perfect ranking system, at least indicates that they're a serious team (for comparison, the men's team is ranked 55th). They hadn't gotten close to qualifying for ICC tournaments before, but this was a team on the up (their current world ranking is the highest they've been). And to qualify for this U-19 World Cup, they had to beat regional power Papua New Guinea in a 3-match series, which they did in a nail-biting decider where they had to defend 4 runs off the last 2 overs. It was the first time Indonesia had qualified for any global ICC tournament.

The group stage of the World Cup played out largely predictably. Grouped with New Zealand, West Indies, and Ireland, Indonesia lost all 3 games convincingly, though the team took a lot of pride in batting out their 20 overs in all three matches against Full Member opposition. Captain Wesika Ratna Dewi's game against Ireland was a highlight, taking 2 for 23 and scoring 34* from Indonesia's innings of 107 for 8 against an attack featuring Georgina Dempsey, a player who six months later would take 4 wickets against the senior Australian team (those 4 wickets: Alyssa Healy, Elysse Perry, Tahlia McGrath, and Ash Gardner). With the top 3 teams in the group advancing, Indonesia was left to play off against fellow 4th placed team Zimbabwe (for those keeping score, this is the match I'm describing).

Zimbabwe wins the toss and elected to bat, which means that Wesika is in the game right away as opening bowler. It's hard not to see her as the great hope of Indonesian cricket, being able to bowl proper inswing and hit boundaries on purpose (still a rarity in Associate women's cricket). The fact that she has gone on to open the batting and bowling in the senior side with distinction is a testament to her skill at age 19. In this match, Wesika only goes and takes a wicket off the first ball, and then another two balls later. She finishes the innings with 5 for 18, including the wicket of opposing captain Kelis Ndhlovu, who was already a fixture in Zimbabwe's senior team at this point. Zimbabwe rally with their lower middle order to 86 for 8, which looks like a low score but is very much defendable in Associate ranks. Over in Melbourne, it's past midnight and I'm glued to the ICC.tv stream, anxiously fretting about how Indonesia's chase will go.

The second innings starts like the first, with a wicket falling in the first over by 15 year-old wunderkind Danielle Meikle. No matter, that brings Wesika to the crease, who hits a boundary per over in the first three overs and gets Indonesia to 22 for 1. Enter Ndhlovu, who takes 2 wickets in the following over and starved Wesika of the strike. Frustrated, the Indonesian skipper spoons a catch back to her opposite number, leaving Indonesia on 31 for 4 with their best batter back in the sheds and needing another 56 runs. Zimbabwe were surely in the box seat now.

Middle-order batters Ratna Ulansari and Thersiana Penu Weo now take it upon themselves to rebuild, but are unable to score more than 3 runs off the next 3 overs, the equation now 47 required from 66 balls with 6 wickets in hand. Then comes the pivotal point of the match, though it is one that quite likely both teams would rather not have happened: Zimbabwe's opening batter Natasha Mtomba is inexplicably asked to bowl her first over of the tournament, and unfortunately it showed. That over saw 13 runs conceded, including 7 coming from wides and a boundary off the last ball. Indonesia now find themselves back in the game, with 34 off 42 to chase.

Ulansari and Penu Weo get the Indonesians to 62, but another twist comes when Chipo Moyo takes a blitz of 3 for 2 to leave Indonesia at 67 for 7, 20 runs short with 5 overs to go, at which point I resign myself to defeat. There's no shame in trying hard but falling short, and the girls would be infinitely better for the experience. However, batters no. 8 and 9 Indriyani and Suarniasih are made of tougher stuff than me, swinging for the fences with nothing to lose. With Ndhlovu bowled out and Meikle tiring, the Indonesian pair rotate the strike and steal a couple of boundaries, culminating with a quick tip and run at the of the 18th over to get Indonesia over the line. It's now 2 am in Melbourne and I can do nothing but beam in pride as a team of Indonesian cricketers accomplish something I never thought would happen in my lifetime - win a game at an ICC World Cup.

There is, of course, a long way to go before Indonesia fully announce themselves on the global stage. For one, their teams need to be able to advance through the East Asia-Pacific qualifying pathways, something the senior women's outfit fell one win short of doing last September. For another, they need to find a way to win more consistently against their fellow Associates at their level, which hopefully will be helped by Indonesia's inclusion in the Asia Cup qualifying pathways. But this win against Full Member Zimbabwe serves as an undeniable first step in entering cricket's world stage, a milestone that can't be taken away.

For me personally, this Indonesian team reaching the World Cup and showing they can win gave me a sense of belonging I didn't know I needed, just by showing me there were other Indonesians who love cricket, just like me. I can only hope that, just like this team, I can also do my bit to push Indonesian cricket forward, even if it's just through writing and talking about it. Cricket can only gain from pushing past its traditional borders, and this victory showed that perfectly.