NEW DELHI: Harmanpreet Kaur and Smriti Mandhana were at the fulcrum of India’s greatest moment in women’s cricket. Just two months ago, the hard work they put in over the last decade paid dividends as they recorded the biggest triumph of their career by lifting the ODI World Cup. On Friday, they return to the site of that historic Nov night — the DY Patil Stadium — but this time as opposition skippers when defending champions Mumbai Indians square off against Royal Challengers Bengaluru in the Women’s Premier League (WPL) opener. A 4-3 win-loss record in favour of MI suggests there is not much that separates two of the most-followed outfits in the WPL, who have delivered some thrilling contests in the past. RCB may have won three of the last four contests, but this time they will be without the services of Ellyse Perry, who pulled out of the tournament for personal reasons. The Australian all-rounder played a crucial role in those victories over MI, including the Eliminator tie of the 2024 edition. RCB went on to win their maiden title that season.
While most teams underwent wholesale changes, MI managed to hold on to their key playing XI members, which brought them two titles. While they retained Harmanpreet, Nat Sciver-Brunt, Hayley Mat thews, Amanjot Kaur and G Kamalini, they spent more than half of their auction purse to buy back all-rounder Amelia Kerr, besides buying Shabnim Ismail, Saika Ishaque, S Sajana, among others. UP Warriorz well-rounded Among the other three teams, there is a lot of buzz around UP Warriorz, who retained just one player. They used the RTM rule to buy back Deepti Sharma, Sophie Eccle stone, Kiran Navgire and Kranti Gaud. Will it be DC’s lucky season? Lanning’s previous team — Delhi Capitals — handed over the reins to Jemimah Rodrigues and added South African Laura Wolvaardt and Chinelle Henry to bolster their batting line-up, which now looks formidable. Giants look to go one step up After struggling for the first two seasons, Gujarat Giants showed signs of revival when they made it to the Eliminator in the last edition. This time, they are looking to go a step further, but for that they should not chop and change if things go south.
