In its two years of existence, the Women's Premier League (WPL), India's franchise-based T20 league, has made careers of many young players. Discarded Indian opener Shafali Verma is hoping to use the upcoming WPL 2025 to revive her career and get into the national team.
The upcoming WPL 2025 will be extremely crucial for Shafali Verma as she looks to make a comeback with a strong outing in the tournament. The explosive opener from Rohtak, Haryana, who made her T20I debut in September 2019, is going through poor form and was dropped from the Indian team for the away tour to Australia in November 2024.
She went back to domestic cricket where she had excellent outings for Haryana recently, reminding the selectors of her return to form. The selectors no doubt will be watching her keenly in the WPL.
Verma is a key member of the Delhi Capitals team that has played back-to-back finals in the first two seasons of WPL.
The preparations are going in full swing. The atmosphere here is really good and everyone is gelling quite well.
Shafali will open the innings for the DC team alongside Australian former skipper Meg Lanning. The Aussie great is the all-time leading run-scorer in the WPL so far while Shafali is third with 561 runs from 17 matches at an average of 35.06 and a strike-rate of 168.46.
Shafali also holds the record for most sixes in WPL, having blasted 33 so far. Lanning described Shafali as an entertainer and said she has the “best seat in the house” while batting alongside the Indian batter.
I love batting with Shafali. She often puts on a very entertaining show, and I have the best seat in the house, watching from the other end most of the time.
Shafali has been out of the national team since last playing in the ODI series against New Zealand at home back in October 2024.
Support from her family has kept Shafali motivated. She finished as the leading run-scorer in the recently-held 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 a hundred and three fifties.
With Pratika Rawal scoring big in the series against the West Indies and Ireland, Shafali will have to come up with something extra special to regain her place back in the playing eleven especially with the ODI World Cup coming up next.
She looks in good touch, enjoying herself, and having fun too, which I think is important. For me, just watching her play with freedom and express herself — when she does that, it plays a really important role for our team.
Shafali too spoke of her great bond with Lanning which reflects on the field too.
I have a great bond with Meg Lanning, and she always guides me. Playing alongside her has been an incredible experience — she's a great friend who keeps me calm and reminds me to be responsible with the bat. Watching her consistency inspires me to push myself, to build longer innings.
For Shafali, the upcoming WPL will have its fair share of challenges - to come back from a series of setbacks is not going to be easy - and she admits that.
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 realized 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.
She is focussed on a good outing in WPL and said that the event gives much-needed game time to women cricketers.
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 learned 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.
Delhi Capitals will open their campaign in WPL 2025 with a clash against former winners Mumbai Indians at Vadidara on Feb 15. The tournament will start a day before with Gujarat Giants Women taking on defending champions Royal Challengers Women in the tournament lung-opener at the same venue.