Meet Zaida James and Ashmini Munisar, West Indies women's next generation of dreamers

Allrounder Zaida James' first match of this T20 World Cup was going pretty well. Batting at No. 8, she joined Stafanie Taylor in the 16th over, with West Indies 83 for 6 against South Africa. She hit the fourth ball she faced, off the notoriously difficult to get away Ayabonga Khaka, for four over extra cover. Then she sent the penultimate delivery of the innings over cover point to finish unbeaten on 15 off 13 balls and give herself something to bowl at with the new ball.

Her first delivery was full on the stumps, just where South Africa's captain, Laura Wolvaardt, likes it. She drove it back to James, who saw a catching opportunity and put her hands up to take it, but the ball hit her thumb and ricocheted onto her jaw. James was sure something was broken.

"It was scary. I didn't really expect it to come that hard because I was literally settling to just hold the ball, but all of a sudden it just hit me," she says in Dubai. "I knew it was my chin and I was pretty scared that it was broken, because when I went out to sit down I could not even open my mouth. Then, I also realised my thumb is hurting me and I saw my thumb is huge."

James took no further part in the game and spent the next three days recovering, mostly nursing the thumb. Four days later, all that remained were faint scratches on her chin and a bruised ego. "I couldn't really eat," she says. "I had to be drinking food, getting smoothies, but now I can actually talk. It's still kind of sore, and sometimes I have to talk from my right side, but it's getting better every day. The thumb is what's keeping me out at the moment, but I just want to fight it out and try to get into the next game."

You'd think she'd have received some extra TLC from her team-mates but it's been quite the opposite. "Her new name is Chinny Chin Chin," Ashmini Munisar, who played the second match against Scotland says. "We've just all been having a giggle at her."

James shakes her head at the lack of sympathy from all quarters. "All my team-mates, they always make fun of everything," she says. "Ashmini says she's my friend but I don't know what to consider her right now."

The pair dissolve into peals of laughter and it becomes apparent how young they are - one, James, still a teenager, and Munisar not yet 21. Both still see cricket as a game that consumed them as kids and only emerged as a viable career option much later.

"For me, it was just about falling in love with it," Munisar says. "I started playing with my neighbour in our yard. He was a U-19 player, Kassim Khan. Anytime he would be practising, I would join him just to get a knock. And then I started playing too."

James' path, and that of her twin sister Janina, was slightly more structured. "I have a pretty sporty story," she says. "First of all, I did swimming and also track and field in primary school and tennis. So in the morning I had cricket. And in the evenings I had tennis. Right now I don't know how the hell I did that.

"We used to play everything in the house. We used to use water bottles as stumps. I've broken TVs and windows. Probably the most expensive thing was the TV."

Both remember watching the 2016 T20 World Cup on the television - the James family had to purchase a new one. "I remember I was up really early in the morning and we were in the room watching the game, jumping up and down, but I wasn't really focused on trying to get to be like them. I was just playing the game for fun," James says. "Looking back, I really noticed that I wanted to be there in 2018, when we had the World Cup in the Caribbean. I picked myself up and thought, 'I have to start working just like them.'"

At that tournament both James sisters were flag bearers and Zaida then became the youngest player to appear for Windward Islands, at the age of 14. A few years later she met Munisar, who was playing for Guyana. The two were part of the West Indies side that played in the inaugural U-19 World Cup in South Africa last year, and were the two standout players in the side. Munisar captained the team and was their second-highest wicket-taker, while James was their most successful player - the only one to score more than 100 runs, and the leading wicket-taker. "It was definitely a cool experience, it being the first U-19 World Cup," Munisar says. "We knew we would set the stage for many more girls to come, so it was really exciting."

It was also an excellent shop window for the young players and James benefited immediately. Five days after West Indies' tournament ended, she made her senior international debut, and she was immediately included in the 2023 T20 World Cup squad, where she played against Ireland and Pakistan. Munisar had to wait six months for her call-up, but it came in June last year.

Now both are establishing themselves in the side and spending time with the players they grew up idolising, the likes of Stafanie Taylor, Hayley Matthews and Deandra Dottin. What's it like sharing a dressing room with those big names? "Legendary is the word," Munisar says. "Superior."

That sums up a lot of the experience so far for them. James played West Indies' opening game against South Africa in the ongoing World Cup, which Munisar sat out, so things only got real for Munisar when she was included in the XI to play Scotland while James nursed her injuries. "Zaida and I talked about this when we played South Africa because before we went out, I told her, 'Z, I'm not feeling it yet. It hasn't sunk in as yet," Munisar says. "And then I remember at the Scotland game, we were going out for the anthem and I told her, 'Now, I can feel it. I'm so nervous right now.'"

The sense of occasion, despite the stadium having all but emptied out after an almost 16,000-strong crowd for the India-Pakistan game just before, almost overwhelmed Munisar. "I was at cover and one went flying through point. I went trying to catch it and I was like, 'Yeah, boy, I'm here on the big stage. I got to do my best, right?' I remember fielding the ball and I was shaking. I was so nervous," she says. "I picked up the ball, threw it back and glanced at Hayley, and she had a laugh at it. And she was like, 'You good?' And I just nodded and quickly said, 'Yeah, yeah, yeah.'"

By the time Munisar was called on to bowl, in the eighth over, the nerves were gone and she felt, "I'm good now. I can do this."

She only bowled that one over but was part of West Indies' first win of the tournament, which kept them in with a shot at the semi-finals. "For us, it's just about going out there and taking it," James says. "Obviously, we want to get out of our group, but I think for us it's just going out there, playing our best cricket and taking it one game at a time. We're not overthinking it. We're just enjoying it."

Enjoying it even if it involves body blows, time on the sidelines, and being ragged by team-mates, because at the end of the day James and Munisar are just two kids living their dream.