Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur, the poster girls of Indian cricket and captains of the two most popular franchises of Women's Premier League, took centrestage on the eve of the opening night of the 2026 edition of the tournament. On their return to DY Patil Stadium - the venue of the 2025 World Cup final - they sat giggling next to each other, their jokes getting caught on the mic.

On Thursday (January 8) though, they didn't have to flank the Indian cricket board officials or dance with Shahrukh Khan. The only thing in front of them was a desk, some cameras and a few mics, around eight sponsor logos behind them, a WPL trophy on their right, and an invisible World Cup trophy screaming its presence from somewhere in the room. The setup wasn't as grand but their cricket had done all the talking, dancing and posturing.

Now, it was time to set the stage for the fourth edition of Women's Premier League, and the players are warming up.

It's in the hope of getting a chance to play in the tournament that Gwalior's 22-year-old Anushka Sharma had made some alterations to her preparations last year: facing hundreds of balls in training daily to work on her range hitting. It's the easiest way, she believes, to catch the eye of WPL scouts and find a place in the tournament, which serves as the stepping stone to the national team. Going through the conventional route, of impressing for Madhya Pradesh and getting the attention of national selectors will be a longer journey.

Unknown to Sophie Devine, Kashvee Gautam has been incessantly observing her at training and taking mental notes.

It's what Kiran Navgire had done, in her bid to register consistent scores, after her last season's performance. At the back of her observations, now at the age of 33, she has taken to a new diet and fitness regime, one that she believes will help elevate her batting standards to that of her former overseas teammates in UP Warriorz. The results were there to see in domestic tournaments.

Three years ago as well, the day before the league had started, it was Mandhana and Harmanpreet who had taken centrestage as the poster girls of Indian cricket. More importantly, after having expressed the need for a women's league to level up Indian cricket for a few years, they had shouldered the burden of being the entertainers who would draw in large crowds to the stadium and in front of television sets - to dismiss the theory that Indian women's cricket lacked the depth to entertain.

The perks to cricket with the initiation of WPL were obvious. It was supposed to be the platform that would make Indian women's cricket the strongest in the world. Development of domestic and international-level Indian cricketers was the big promise of the tournament. Only three editions of the tournament later, they had a World Cup trophy to showcase - a trophy that had eluded them for more than 50 years.

What does Indian cricket desire from WPL 2026 then? A T20 World Cup title? Or something beyond?

Amanjot Kaur, minutes into winning the 2025 World Cup, set the vision straight. "We have created history. This is just the start. Indian cricket is going to be at the next level. We are going to dominate all over the world in every format," she had said.

If Amanjot's optimistic vision is to find wings, the task begins at WPL 2026. It's the stage to see if Amanjot's vision and belief have been bought into by the rest of her peers - those who were part of that team that evening, and those who aspire to be there at the next such milestone. Will the Indians come harder at the overseas counterparts? Will they cross the finish line with more confidence than hesitation?

For Indian cricket to take that aspirational step, it will require the players to level up in fitness, fielding and power-game, and increase the bench strength. As evidenced by the preparations of Navgire, Anushka and Kashvee, that realisation and opportunity are not lost on them. For those who missed the memo, WPL 2026 can become the first big stage to witness that change.

In depth, a larger ecosystem has to come around to find the stage and pathway for young girls aspiring to emulate their favourite cricketers. But, in the vast network of Indian cricket, is it all a burden of one tournament? Afterall, how transformational can 10 days of preparation, and three weeks of cricket possibly be, especially with a short turnaround time between games and high focus on immediate results?

Irrespective of what the coaches and owners of franchises say, developing Indian cricket and young players isn't their core vision. Player scouting and development is an inadvertent outcome of their involvement in the business of women's cricket and their brand positioning (if not just their profits).

This involvement has shown immediate results.

When the WPL had kickstarted, Renuka Singh, Meghana Singh, Arundhati Reddy and Shikha Pandey were the only Indian seamers with international experience. Since then, after displaying their chops to handle pressure, Kranti Goud, Saima Thakor and Titas Sadhu have also broken through.

There's a similar trend in other departments: Kashvee Gautam, Sayali Satghare and Amanjot Kaur as seam-bowling all-rounders; Minnu Mani, Saika Ishaque, Shreyanka Patil as spinners. In only three seasons, 19 players have made their India debut after featuring in the WPL, the range stretching from the 17-year-old G Kamilini to the 33-year-old S Asha (since then, only six Indians have made their debuts for the national team without featuring in the WPL).

The inadvertent outcome of the tournament has resulted in players themselves pushing to level up, and the benchmark isn't too far beyond their reach. But as Harmanpreet mentioned a day earlier, WPL doesn't just present a stepping stone for the junior players to find a quicker route to the national team, but also allows greater exposure and pressure situations for the seniors to level up their game.

If the ultimate goal is domination, one that would validate that the victory against Australia in the semifinals wasn't a fluke show, that India not stumbling in the final wasn't an odd occurrence, WPL 2026 is going to be that start. The World Cup victory has offered Indian cricket the optimism to believe that the road to world domination is visible.

The possibility of this elevation won't be more believable to anyone as much as the two women who took centrestage on Thursday, the ones who stuck together through the lows, endured the scars and led the highs - witnessing and becoming the face of this change. Three seasons later, in a competition largely captained by Australians, they sit there as the only winners of the world's most-watched women's cricket league.

"We really want to sit back and say that we are the best team in the world," Mandhana confessed. "We still have a lot of things to improve on. I am sure WPL is going to bridge that gap for us. In the coming years, we want to do that. Whenever we play for India, we always discuss how we want to be the best team in the world. Not for one or two tournaments, but for the whole year, any cricket we play and dominate it. Every WPL is just getting us closer to that.

Harmanpreet added, "We are not satisfied with just one World Cup. We have so much cricket coming up this year and in the next two or three years. Every time we go to the field, we want to go with the best mindset, that winning mindset we have been always talking about. It is good to see that not only us, but other players are also coming up and thinking and speaking about how we want to be champions all the time. That shows that WPL has made a lot of impact on us.

"Players are not in their comfort zone. They are working really hard. They are playing against overseas. They are playing with overseas and learning a lot from them. Now that gap is not there, which we used to feel when they are coming for international cricket.WPL has had a lot of impact on our cricket. I am really happy that as a team, we are setting bigger goals for ourselves.

In 2026, as a new era begins in Indian cricket, the flagbearers are looking for more helping hands to play a part in the quest for world domination.

More details

Dates and venues:

DY Patil Stadium, Navi Mumbai - January 9-17 (11 league matches)

BCA Stadium, Kotambi - January 19-February 5 (9 league matches + 1 Playoffs matches)

Timings (as per IST):

There are two double-headers. The match between Gujarat Giants and UP Warriorz on January 10, and the match between Mumbai Indians and UP Warriorz on January 17 will start at 3.30 PM.

All other matches are scheduled to start at 7.30 PM