On Tuesday, October 6, 2026, Harmanpreet Kaur announced her resignation as India’s captain in all formats. Smriti Mandhana was named to succeed her. India’s first Women’s Cricket World Cup victory in 2025 and two Asian Games gold medals, including the most recent in Nagoya, were overseen by the 37-year-old, who had been in charge of the nation since 2016. Harmanpreet Kaur continued to play in India’s T20I and ODI teams for the current Zimbabwe series despite giving up the captaincy.
In the eighth over of India’s innings during the third Twenty20 International in Raipur, Kaur walked to the crease at number four. Before this match, she had gone eight innings without a half-century, but when she encountered Kudzai Chigora’s bowling, her aggressive intent became apparent. There doesn’t seem to be any pressure anymore. At the post-match presentation, Harmanpreet Kaur stated, “I think it’s all about enjoying myself on the field now, and I think that’s what I want to do.”
How did Harmanpreet regain form after leaving captaincy?
She got off to a good start early in her stay, hitting a boundary off Loryn Phiri’s bowling. But it was when she faced Chigora’s over that she really got going, scoring 20 runs with two boundaries and two sixes. She reached 91 off 41 balls while maintaining an aggressive strategy throughout her innings. I believe I realized the pitch was good and the bat was coming nicely to the ball when I hit for a four on the first [second] ball. I believe that shot gave me a lot of confidence. After that, I decided to just keep going and see how things turned out.
“I think bat swing is something you know is my key, and I just want to keep repeating that in the nets, and I think again I just want to give credit to my batting coach Himanshu bhaiya, who has been working really hard and understood the kind of batting I can do,” Harmanpreet Kaur remarked.
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He simply wants me to experience the same level of pressure every time we get together and spend time in the nets so that I won’t feel any more pressure when I’m playing. His strategies and ideas, in my opinion, are very effective. This is what I’m here for, and I really enjoy myself in the middle. I’m glad those runs came, and I just want to enjoy batting,” she continued.
