WPL: The grace of Smriti Mandhana

Sneha, who had a reunion of sorts with Mandhana, recalls how they were planning to get her out while the youngsters were more excited about meeting and taking selfies with Mandhana.
India's vice captain Smriti Mandhana will lead the Royal Challengers Banglore in the inaugural WPL. (File Photo | AFP)
India's vice captain Smriti Mandhana will lead the Royal Challengers Banglore in the inaugural WPL. (File Photo | AFP)

GQEBERHA (SOUTH AFRICA): The bidding was fierce. Neither Mumbai Indians nor Royal Challengers Bengaluru were willing to concede. They were trying to secure exceptional talent in the inaugural Women’s Premier League and they knew how important the player would be to the fortunes of the team in the WPL. The gavel stopped the bidding at Rs 3.4 crore. An amount, offered by RCB, was never predicted in the WPL. It was a figure that not just broke expectations but also symbolised the rise of the game and its popularity.

Thousands of miles away in South Africa, Smriti Mandhana, who is an integral part of the India team at the ICC T20 World Cup, was celebrating along with her teammates. She has become the highest-paid woman cricketer. The entire team was following each and every action live and every sound of the gavel and sum announced by the auctioneer were cheered with zest. Of course, the Indian team was not alone in this celebration, all other teams at the World Cup too joined in.

Mandhana was the star of the show and it was poetic that her name was the first to be called during the auction. She has been part of this India team for a while and has been an epitome of sporting excellence both on and off the field. To put the bid into context, in the inaugural men's IPL, MS Dhoni, the highest-priced player, accounted for 30 per cent of the team’s auction purse. And here Mandhana’s price is 28.33 per cent of the same. On Saturday, she was named the captain of RCB. 

Hailing from Sangli district in Maharashtra, the southpaw got into cricket quite early, thanks to the passion of her father Shriniwas Mandhana, a textile businessman. In fact, it was he who made her and her brother Shravan bat left-handed from a very young age to give them an edge.

Maybe, it was the way she was introduced to the game or that she was from Sangli, a district that was famous for its connection with Marathi theatre art, on the field, with the bat in hand, there isn’t a better word to describe her than an ‘artist’. Her impeccable timing and the touch and grace of elegance with which she plays her shots have got better with time.

Talent was visible even from a tender age, ever since she broke into the age-group teams. She showed glimpses of greatness, like Sneha Deepthi, who made her India debut in the same series as Mandhana in 2013, recollects succinctly. "Arey! yeh toh out hoti nahi hai (she does not get out at all)," says Sneha.

"It was in 2011. We were in Bhopal for an U-19 match and she was the pillar of the Maharashtra team. She played brilliantly. And being a lefty, it was so hard to get her out," recalls the Andhra batter. From thereon, the duo’s career grew together as they got into the India team in 2013. In a team that was filled with seniors, the youngsters developed a special bond. While Sneha was left out of the team shortly, Mandhana did not look back.

From being a young bespectacled prodigy, she went on to score six international centuries and won the ICC Women’s Cricketer of the Year twice — in 2019 and 2021. She is the vice-captain of the India team now. As Mandhana made strides on the field, her off-field stature, too, grew steadily. She became the most-wanted big Indian name in the overseas leagues as well.

Sneha, who had a reunion of sorts with Mandhana, recalls how they were planning to get her out while the youngsters were more excited about meeting and taking selfies with Mandhana. But the one thing she is impressed and happy about is the fact that despite the fame, Mandhana as a person hasn’t changed. "We don’t talk too much now but she has not changed at all," says Sneha. "When I asked, she said, ‘these things will come and go, but friends are friends."

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