New Delhi, Feb 7 With the 2025 season of the Women’s Premier League (WPL) just a week away, Delhi Capitals’ opener Shafali Verma said she is determined to make a strong comeback to the national set-up with good performances, adding that the only thing in her control is preparation.
After the ODI series against New Zealand, Shafali was omitted from the 50-over set-up for series against Australia, West Indies and Ireland. She was not even included for T20Is against West Indies in Navi Mumbai.
It meant Shafali was back to playing domestic cricket, and finished as leading run-getter in the Senior Women's One-Day Challenger Trophy, amassing 414 runs in five matches at an average of 82.80 and a strike rate of 145.26, including hitting one hundred and three fifties.
"To be honest, the past few months have been tough for me. My father suffered a heart attack, and just a couple of days later, I was dropped from the ODI squad. So, it was a mentally difficult phase, but my father encouraged me, and my family stood by me throughout.
“I’ve realised that my job is to score runs whenever I get the opportunity, and that’s where I want to focus. The only thing in my control is my preparation, if I train well and score runs, I know I can come back stronger," said Shafali in a statement issued by the franchise on Friday.
With DC set to start their WPL 2025 campaign on February 15 against Mumbai Indians in Vadodara, they will be aiming to go one step further after consecutive runners-up finishers. Shafali shared on the side’s preparation for WPL 2025 happening in the pre-tournament camp in Pune and talked about how this competition has given tons of learning opportunities to Indian players.
“The preparations are going in full swing. The atmosphere here is really good and everyone is gelling up quite well. The players get to play a good number of matches in WPL. You get some very good opportunities to make small tweaks here and there in your game.
“Personally, I have learnt how to build my innings while being a part of WPL. The experience of playing with foreign players is a different learning for all of us. One of the things that I like the most is the way they keep themselves calm and composed on and off the field. That is one learning that I have got while playing with the overseas players,” she added.
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