Maryam Osama Khalil Omar (born 8 March 1993) is a Kuwaiti-Palestinian engineer and cricketer who plays for the Kuwait women's national cricket team as a right-handed batting all-rounder. She has also captained the national team. Born and raised in Kuwait, Omar is a Palestinian, and has been described as a "global grand tour all on her own"; she was educated in a Pakistani school in Kuwait, and also in Melbourne, Australia, where she now lives.
Early life and education
Kuwait Omar was born in Kuwait to mother Salwa and father Osama. She has three sisters, Amal, Zuhoor and Budoor. From an early age, she participated in a variety of sports, including basketball, gymnastics, judo, martial arts and swimming. She does not really remember whether her first baby steps were on land or in water: "My father's love for swimming had a big impact on me and I even competed at club levels in swimming tournaments." She has also said that her mother "did a great job in making me tough", and that it was for her mother that she attained a black belt in karate. In 2010, aged 17, Omar was introduced to cricket at her Pakistani school in Kuwait. The national cricket board was targeting a number of schools to try to recruit girls to play the game. "My sports teacher came and told me that Kuwait Cricket was looking for girls to play in the Under-19 Asia Cup, and I said, 'What is cricket?'", she told Abu Dhabi-based newspaper The National in 2022. With encouragement from her mother, who suggested that she might ultimately make the national team, "I rocked up and was the only Arab in the side. I thought it might be hard for me to learn the game, but the coaches were so supportive." Before long, she was loving cricket, and had become so dedicated to learning it that she stopped following other sports. When Omar started out as a cricketer, she found that her first name, which is very common in the Arab world, created a difficulty. So many other cricketers had the same first name that every time someone called out to her, "seven heads would turn around and I would get really confused." Omar therefore decided to adopt a unique nickname. She chose "MOKO", which is made up of the first letters of her full name. Her first preference shirt number is 25, which she believes is her lucky number. Omar was also confronted with two other difficulties. First, cricket is seldom discussed in the Arab world, even though it is popular in Kuwait, where about 1.5 million of the total population of four million is made up of expats from Test-playing nations, including almost one million Indians. When Omar started playing cricket, her parents had never even heard of it. Although Omar, as a pupil of a Pakistani school, already had a vague awareness of the game, she neither understood the rules very much, nor knew how big it was. However, her coaches, Tariq Rasool and Tahir Khan, taught her all the cricket skills she needed, and even advised her to learn about the game by watching it on television. Omar also trained for at least three hours daily, and attended umpiring and coaching courses organised by Cricket Kuwait. She watched videos of matches at Sharjah Cricket Stadium, and AB de Villiers of South Africa became her hero. Her parents, after observing her hard work, were supportive, even though they still do not really understand or relate to the game. Secondly, and as Omar herself has put it, "Playing competitive sport is not a traditional role for women in the Middle East." Omar says that it is not easy for girls from the region to pursue a career in or passion for sport, and that none of her three sisters even play any sports. Instead, her sisters conform to social expectations by enjoying cooking, fashion, shopping and socialising with friends at home, and think that sports are for boys. "My sisters call me the tomboy", she told The National. In that context, Omar's father initially had difficulty in accepting her sporting aspirations, especially as they had the potential to take her away from her family. Although he eventually came around, he warned her that she would have to give up the game if it adversely affected her studies, and imposed a strict curfew of 9:00 pm, as in Arab culture it is not acceptable for girls to be out late. According to Omar, "It is good to have a strict dad because I have learnt to manage my time and push my limits." After leaving school in 2010, Omar studied at the Australian College of Kuwait (ACK) for a Bachelor of Engineering Technology in civil and structural engineering. She completed that degree with "straight As" and "a perfect GPA" in 2014, and then worked for two years as a structural engineer in Kuwait. At that time, she first saw women playing franchise team cricket, when she happened, while visiting a cricket equipment shop in Kuwait, to see a broadcast of a match in Australia's domestic T20 competition, the WBBL. The experience led her to dream about playing for a WBBL team.
Australia Omar's coaches in Kuwait, all of them Pakistanis or Indians, had already made her aware that Australia was arguably cricket's No 1 destination. Largely in pursuit of her WBBL dream, she submitted what has been described as "an impressive application" for a master's academic scholarship from the ACK to study at partner university CQUniversity in Australia, and was awarded the inaugural scholarship. Initially, she was to have been sent to Rockhampton in Queensland, but she specifically asked to study in Melbourne, because "it's the home of cricket". Omar arrived in Melbourne, and began her master's in civil engineering, in 2016. The university contacted local cricket clubs, and she began playing for Essendon Maribyrnong in the 2016/17 season. While studying in Melbourne, she had more time to spend on cricket training. She also worked with Cricket Victoria as cricket development coordinator to drive female participation, and as a bridge engineer (intern) at pitt&sherry, an engineering consultancy. Since completing her master's in 2018, she has continued to live in Melbourne.
Domestic career
Kuwait On 19 October 2013, Omar captained Kuwait Blue, one of three teams involved in a full-day women's domestic tournament held at Sulaibiya turf ground in Kuwait. After leading her team to victory in the round robin matches against Kuwait Red and Kuwait Green, and to a nine wicket loss to Kuwait Red in the final, Omar shared the best batswoman of the tournament award with Amna Sharif.
… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.
