Delhi Capitals’ Nandani Sharma celebrates with captain Jemimah Rodrigues after taking the wicket of Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s Shreyanka Patil during the Women’s Premier League (WPL) 2026 T20 cricket match between Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Delhi Capitals, at BCA Stadium, in Vadodara, Gujarat, on January 24, 2026. Photo: BCCI via PTI
Riding on Laura Wolvaardt’s unbeaten 42 in the modest chase, Capitals sauntered home in 15.4 overs.
DC’s splendid bowling performance was the result of a collective effort. Seamer Nandani Sharma ran through the RCB lower-order to finish with figures of 4-0-26-3. Chinelle Henry, Marizanne Kapp and Minnu Mani took two wickets each while Shree Charani chipped in with a scalp.
Henry and Kapp set the tone with testing opening spells. Kapp had the in-form Smriti Mandhana fretting with a vociferous leg-before appeal in the second over, but Capitals couldn’t review because the South African had overstepped.
Having ambled to five off 13 balls, Smriti finally broke the shackles with successive fours against Henry.
The deliveries were on the fuller side and allowed Smriti to unfurl her exquisite drives. When Nandani came into the attack instead of Henry in the fifth over, the southpaw repeated the dose.
However, it didn’t take much longer for Kapp to break the opening partnership. Grace Harris’ leading edge off an attempted flick was snaffled at backward point.
The DC bowlers went on to string together a run of 21 deliveries without conceding a boundary. That was halted off the final ball of the eighth over, when Smriti danced down the track and smashed Sneh Rana for a maximum over long-on.
Smriti, though, wasn’t able to carry on. Once she slog-swept Minnu to Niki Prasad at deep square leg in the 10th over, RCB descended into a deeper hole. The last nine wickets fell for just 47 runs as none of the incoming batters were able to find a way out of trouble.
Nandani, who picked up a five-for earlier in her debut season, was brilliant at the death. The 24-year-old gave away 11 runs in her last two overs and added three wickets to her tally to reclaim the Purple Cap.
Published – January 25, 2026 12:30 am IST
