Issy Wong was just 20 years old when she became an all-format international cricketer, a feat not many can lay claim to. She is among the fastest bowlers in the women's circuit, one of the most promising young players in England, and was earmarked as the successor to Katherine Sciver-Brunt.
Wong, however, has fallen off England's plans over the last year, having been dropped from all three formats, but the harshest blow was losing her place in the T20 side. She missed out on last year's World Cup, where England lost the semi-final to hosts South Africa, but there's another one coming up in September-October in Bangladesh and with it comes the chance for redemption.
With year's Women's Premier League, starting February 23, being held in the lead-up to the 2024 T20 World Cup, Wong is hoping to use the tournament in India to make her way back into the England squad by working on the "feedback" she has received from the team management.
Wong had a stellar season for champions Mumbai Indians in the inaugural WPL, with 15 wickets in 10 games (including a hat-trick in the Eliminator match). Except, she couldn't quite replicate the same form in the home summer, managing just one wicket in 30 balls across five games in the Hundred for Birmingham Phoenix and featured in just one T20I in 2023. It's ironing out those ups and downs that she's focused on now.
"I'm really looking forward to it," Wong told ESPNcricinfo of the upcoming WPL. "I probably played close to my best cricket last year and I'm looking to build on that and to keep hopefully contributing. That's what, as players, we want to do. We want to contribute to the success of the team, and I was lucky enough to do that last year. Obviously, probably things didn't go my way last summer but that's life, isn't it, sometimes good things, sometimes [bad] ... But otherwise, you say 'sometimes you're the bug and sometimes you're the windshield'. I felt like the windshield in India last year and I was probably the bug in England. It is what it is. You just got to keep driving.
"Obviously disappointed not to be involved with the England stuff but the feedback I've had is really clear so it's up to me now to go away and to do something about it. Last year as well I had missed out on the [T20] World Cup just before the WPL and sometimes you get bad news and it's all about how you react to it. They've been very clear with what they want from me which is good and all I can do now is try and do something about it and give them more reasons to pick me than not. That's what I'll try and do and wherever I am, I'm going to try and get better as a cricketer. I've got a really good opportunity to work with two of the best fast bowlers (team-mate Shabnim Ismail and mentor and bowling coach Jhulan Goswami) to ever play the women's game and that's such a good opportunity for someone like myself. I'm 21, I don't know anything, so I'm just here to learn off people like Gosy (Goswami)."
In her solitary T20I last year, against Sri Lanka at home in September, Wong looked visibly out of sorts, struggling with her run-up. Her first of the two overs she bowled saw her deliver a wide as well as three front-foot no-balls before her second leaked three fours to finish with figures of 2-0-24-0. While other younger bowlers are being played ahead of her for England now, Wong has been working on her game the off-season.
England captain Heather Knight had even said openly that Wong's run-up issues were because she was "listening to a lot of different voices," and that she would work with England's bowling coach Matt Mason "to get a bit of context of where she's at."
"I spent a lot of time towards the back-end of last summer and over the winter working with Matt Mason and working really closely with them just on rebuilding stuff," Wong said. "We called it 'repair work' at the time, just to get me back at my best. I feel like that's all behind me now and the next step is match practice so playing in England A games (before England's T20I series in India) out here in December was fantastic for me because I was back playing in games and competing and I'm a competitor and I think a lot of the time you kind of over-analyse, especially last summer I wasn't playing a lot of games.
"[I] probably thought too much about what I was doing, and I ended up doing kind of the wrong things. Whereas I think I'm probably at my best when I'm given a situation to get our team out of and all my energy is going into how I'm going to win the game in front of me as opposed to what my left leg's doing, what my right leg's doing, what my pinky on my left hand's doing. It doesn't matter. You just got to win the game in front of you. Those games were really helpful in December to get some match practice, but I'm absolutely fit and ready to kick it on and to try and contribute as much as possible."
The A series in Mumbai was Wong's last competitive series, where she picked up four wickets from three T20s and was named the Player of the Match in the last two for her performances of 2 for 18 and 28* off 30 and 1 for 35 and 35 off 15.
Even though a spot in the starting XI may not be assured this time since Mumbai have bought the experienced Ismail at the recent auction, a good outing at the WPL could put Wong back on the radar of England women's coach Jon Lewis, who is at the WPL too, coaching UP Warriorz.
"I love taking wickets, but I don't think it's the only aspect of my game," Wong said. "I want to contribute wherever I can if that means standing at fine leg and saving boundaries then put me at fine leg and I'll save you some boundaries. I want to win games for my team and that's all that's on my mind at the moment. What I do might reflect well and might reflect badly on me, but I want to win games for MI at the moment and maybe England will happen in the future."
Home advantage is not something Mumbai can benefit from this time. As compared to last year, when the entire WPL was held in and around the city, this year's WPL will be split between Bengaluru and Delhi. Despite being its first year, the crowd at last season's WPL made Wong feel that people were "invested," even if her best memories were from sell-out crowds back home.
"In England, last summer we saw a really good atmosphere and especially the Ashes games with the Barmy Army coming and filling it up," she said. "We sold out Lord's, we sold out Edgasbton and The Oval. They are the biggest grounds in England and the atmosphere in them is really good but in terms of consistent atmosphere in domestic games, the WPL was really special. It felt like what we were doing on the pitch mattered to people off the pitch. It felt like people were really invested and we definitely felt the support coming from off the pitch while we were on the pitch. I think that really helped us last year."