CHENNAI: When India's five T20I match tour of Bangladesh was announced, the bugle for preparing for the upcoming T20 World Cup was officially blown. After three white-ball series losses on home soil since taking over as head coach, albeit against better-ranked teams, Amol Muzumdar had to let bygones be bygones and start fresh after another successful season of the Women's Premier League (WPL) in March.
One of the lessons from the WPL was even seen in a way the squad was selected for the tour. Muzumdar had mentioned creating a pool of players from the franchise league, while captain Harmanpreet Kaur had spoken about how players who want to make it to the World Cup squad can use performances in WPL as a launch pad. On the back of their outing in the WPL, Sajeevan Sajana and Asha Sobhana got their maiden call-ups for the national side, while in the absence of Jemimah Rodrigues, Dayalan Hemalatha got the opportunity to make her comeback. Radha Yadav, who last played for India in the T20 World Cup in 2023, also found a place in the squad. All of these players had exceptional outings with their respective franchises in the sophomore season and were rewarded for their consistency.
Once the series started, the players repaid this trust with some eye-catching performances, thereby helping the team win 5-0. Radha Yadav was at her best as she bagged 10 wickets in the series and won the Player of the Series award. The inclusion of the likes of Yadav, Asha and Shreyanka Patil meant that India did not have to use part-time spinners like Shafali Verma and Kaur herself as they did in the previous tour of Bangladesh. There was enough bowling depth for Kaur to use against the hosts and it felt like a step closer to having a role clarity for players. In the pace department, alongside Renuka Singh Thakur and Pooja Vastrakar, young Titas Sadhu also got a taste of the challenge of foreign conditions.
In the batting department, even without Rodrigues, India found a formidable order that could win them more fixtures in the near future. After a disappointing outing against England and Australia in Mumbai a few months ago, Kaur, the batter, was back. She trusted her abilities and made the most of the middle overs during the series and finished as the third-highest run scorer.
Vice-captain Smriti Mandhana, carrying her WPL form in the series, looked effortless on most of the occasions. However, it was her opening partner Shafali Verma's aggression that stole the show. It did not come off on all occasions, but if she is backed by the team management to continue with the approach, India could unlock the powerplay beast.
All of this batting depth has also released the pressure to use Deepti Sharma as a bowling allrounder. India can now afford to use Sharma's skills as a bowler alone, and if needed she can whack a few deliveries in the death overs without getting bogged down. She has shown her batting prowess in the WPL, and if used as a designated lower-order hitter alongside Sajana or Vastrakar, it can be a massive gain for India.
"The calmness all the players showed in the series is something I would like to take to the World Cup," Kaur said after the final T20I on Thursday. "There was some calmness while batting, while bowling, and even in the fielding even though we made some mistakes, we know how we can improve, and in the next month, we will work hard on that."
As India were in the middle of the series against the hosts, ICC announced the schedule of the T20 World Cup in October, where the semifinalists from the 2023 edition have been grouped with the likes of Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, in the so-called "Group of Death", believes that the series has helped the players and management to attain the necessary knowledge to face rivals with their best combination.
"This tournament will give us a lot of confidence, [playing] in the conditions will definitely help us. Whatever we learnt here, we can take that to the World Cup. We are really working hard on that. Hopefully, in the World Cup, we will be able to do whatever we can do. I know our team has that much potential and hopefully, we play our best cricket," she added.
After a 5-0 series win on foreign soil, the first white-ball series win for Muzumdar as a head coach, there are still a lot of questions in front of the team management. For now, with the World Cup mere four months away, India have made a step in the right direction.