WPL has given our players a lot of confidence, says Harmanpreet Kaur after India’s series win over Bangladesh

Sylhet, May 9 After India secured a 5-0 sweep in the T20I series against Bangladesh, captain Harmanpreet Kaur was quick to credit her team’s stellar performance to the confidence gained from playing in the Women’s Premier League (WPL).

"The WPL gave our players a lot of confidence, because of the way a lot of us played in the WPL, we have improved our game during that time, and those results are giving results here. We just need to keep doing the right things, and results will come," said Harmanpreet after the fifth T20I ended, where India beat Bangladesh by 21 runs.

Players like Dayalan Hemalatha, Radha Yadav, Asha Sobhana, along with Harmanpreet, Shafali Verma, Smriti Mandhana, Deepti Sharma and Shreyanka Patil chipped in with sizeable contributions in the entire series after doing well in WPL 2024.

"The calmness all the players showed in the series is something I would like to take to the World Cup. 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 one month, we will work hard on that," added Harmanpreet.

India's next assignment will be a multi-format series at home against South Africa in June-July, before travelling to Sri Lanka for the Women’s Asia Cup, to be played in a 20-over format ahead of the Women’s T20 World Cup in Bangladesh from October 3-20.

India would be happy to sign off from Bangladesh with a commanding series win at the Sylhet International Cricket Stadium, where it would be playing its Women’s T20 World Cup league stage games, starting from the campaign opener against New Zealand on October 4.

"Definitely, 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," stated Harmanpreet.

Left-arm spinner Radha Yadav took 3-24 to be named Player of the Match and also took Player of the Series award for picking 10 wickets in five games at an economy rate of 5.05. It was a welcome return to international cricket for Radha, who was out of national set-up for a year before taking 10 wickets in nine games of WPL 2024 got her back into the Indian team.

“I just wanted to bowl wicket to wicket, that's what I had worked on before the series. WPL is helping all the girls, hopefully, we'll get some players from Bangladesh as well. I'm trying to bowl in the right areas and working hard on my fitness as well.”

“I worked on my bowling for this series and it's coming off well. I want to bowl wicket to wicket, one odd ball was wide maybe. Really nice to play five matches here (before the World Cup) for these conditions and really looking forward to the World Cup,” she concluded.

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