Mumbai, Jan 7: Harmanpreet Kaur on Wednesday credited Women’s Premier League and her franchise Mumbai Indians in helping her develop a “winning mindset”, which she made good use of while leading the national team to women’s ODI World Cup title.
Harmanpreet, who has led Mumbai Indians to two titles in the WPL, said working with the franchise has helped her approach competitions differently.
“I believe wherever I go, I want to think about winning because participation, we have been doing for so many years, I think that doesn’t change anything,” Harmanpreet said at a press conference organised by Mumbai Indians here.
“But if you go with a winning mindset and work towards that, that can bring a lot of things to you and to your country. WPL made a lot of changes in me, especially thinking because before that, some limitations were there but when I came here and worked with MI.”
Talking further about the changed mindset, she said, “MI has been winning IPL title for so many years and that winning mindset came and when I was sitting with them, they were always thinking about what best we can do to beat any team or to win the title.
“That’s what has completely changed,” she added.
Lisa Keightley, the new coach of the Mumbai Indians, said Indian domestic players are getting the right amount of competition, which is now reflecting in their performances.
“The Indian international players are getting fantastic competitions to lead into international cricket in World Cups and being put under pressure,” Lisa said.
“And if you’re doing that in your domestic competition, it’s only going to enhance your performance when you go away and play international cricket. We’ve seen the result of that through India winning the last 50-over World Cup when they’re under pressure in the semi-final to win that match, and then go on and win the final.
“It was big for the country and big for those players like Harman who have played a number of years and had that feeling of winning one of those big tournaments,” she added.
The Australian said India winning the women’s ODI World Cup was also possible with the advent of the WPL.
“I think that’s a result of WPL in the last three years and we’re seeing the reward when they go away to international competitions,” she said.
Keightley has taken charge of the defending champions Mumbai Indians in the WPL after Charlotte Edwards quit her role to become the England women’s team head coach.
“It’s my first job in Mumbai and I think it’s a very special city for me because whenever I get a chance to play here, I always get to see positive results,” she said.
“I am sure this season is also going to be very special. I am really happy that last season and last year turned out to be very good overall for women’s cricket. I hope this year also starts the same way.”
She acknowledged that the challenge for the leadership group will be to ensure that the squad is in the right mental shape for the competition starting on January 9 here.
“The team’s pretty settled. We’ve got a really good core group of players and we’ll have really good role clarity going into those matches,” she said.
“I can’t see that it would change too much, but the hunger and the passion, the family atmosphere that we create is really important. It’s up to myself, Harman and coaching staff to make sure our players feel very supported and backed when they go out to execute their role,” she added. (PTI)
