Tag : WPL

New Delhi: When India suffered a narrow five-run loss against Australia in the semifinal of the Women's T20 World Cup on Thursday, many fans and experts felt that the Harmanpreet Kaur-led side should have won the game given that they were cruising comfortably towards the target at one point of time. But India crumbled under pressure to get knocked out of the tournament. It wasn't that the Indian team faltered for the first time in knockout games of ICC events. And, coincidentally, Australia -- the firm favourites to win the tournament -- have beaten the Women in Blue in the knockouts of global tournaments quite frequently in the recent past. There is no doubt that five-time T20 World Cup champions Australia are formidable and ruthless, but they are beatable too. In fact, it's the Indian team which seems to have that talent to beat the Aussies in an ICC event, but perhaps they lack big-match temperament and professionalism. And the arrival of Women's Premier League (WPL) will certainly bridge that gap and can transform them into a world-beating side. Over the years, Australia and England have dominated women's cricket as their cricket boards invested in building a world-beating talent pipeline, while women's cricket in India not coming under the BCCI umbrella for many years harmed them financially, which led them to suffer in other aspects as well. Ever since the BCCI started to administer women's cricket in 2006, things got better year by year, be it domestic or international cricket. But, women's cricket in India needed something big to take a giant leap and the inaugural edition of WPL, beginning March 4, is a massive opportunity for players to help them shatter the glass ceilings and propose cricket as a financially viable ca ...