Shikha Pandey

Shikha Pandey (born 12 May 1989) is an Indian cricketer. She was born in Karimnagar, Goa. She made her international Twenty20 (T20) debut on 9 March 2014 while playing against Bangladesh at Cox's Bazar cricket stadium in Bangladesh. In August of the same year, she made her One Day International cricket (ODI) and Test cricket debut while playing against England at Wormsley and Scarborough respectively. As of 27 November 2014^[update] she has played two Tests, three ODIs and six T20s for India.

Pandey did her schooling under the Central Board of Secondary Education, India. She holds a degree in Electronics and Electrical Engineering from Goa College of Engineering. In 2011, she joined Indian Air Force, and became an Air traffic controller.

At the age of 15, Pandey was selected to play for Goa in 2004. Later at the age of 17 for the 2007–08 season, she was selected to play for Goa's Women Senior State Side. During a south zone under-19 cricket tournament, former Indian women's team captain and then Indian coach and south zone selector Purnima Rao encouraged her and motivated her to play for India. She took an year off from her engineering course and played in Board President's XI against the visiting England and West Indies teams in 2010 and January 2011 respectively. She continued to play for Goa and after 2013–14 season of Inter-State T20 tournament (Plate group) she was selected for India's tour of Bangladesh consisting 3 friendly matches with Bangladesh and 2014 ICC Women's World Twenty20. After Dilip Sardesai, she is the first player from Goa to play for any Indian national team. She is also the first Goa Cricket Association affiliated cricketer to play international level cricket for India. She is the first Goa-born player to play ODIs and international T20s and 2nd player to play Test cricket, after Saredesai, thus becoming first cricketer to have played both state level cricket for Goa and international level cricket for India. After the T20 World Cup, she played one-off Test match and 2 ODI matches against England. She was instrumental in India's win against South Africa on 26 November 2014. She took 3 wickets and scored 59 runs.