Smriti Mandhana overcomes 'massive flu' to play title-winning innings for RCB

If there was the faintest murmur about Smriti Mandhana going missing in finals, she silenced them. And she did it despite suffering from flu, leading Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) to their second WPL title with 87 off 41 balls in a chase of 204 against Delhi Capitals in Vadodara.

"Massive, massive flu," was how RCB head coach Malolan Rangarajan described it after their six-wicket victory, with the WPL trophy next to him. "She was seriously unwell with a high fever. "But to turn up, not even show it, nobody in the team [knew]…for one second also didn't show it. That's the person Smriti is. When I spoke to her this afternoon, she said, 'Nahi, Malo, koi problem nahi (there's no problem), I'll be there.' So that's her with her work ethic."

Even by Mandhana's lofty standards, her innings was a masterful example of pacing a high-pressure chase. She played a supporting role to her Australian partner Georgia Voll at the start, before sensationally picking up her tempo.

Mandhana was 6 off 5 at the end of the fifth over before she began to unleash carnage. The high point of her innings was how she dismantled DC's spin threat. Being RCB's only left-hand batter, Mandhana attacked Sree Charani's left-arm spin, which had proved so effective during the Vadodara leg of the season, and left DC captain Jemimah Rodrigues bereft of options.

Mandhana was in the kind of zone where she was dispatching similar deliveries to different areas - backing away to slap a short ball through point, or casually sauntering across the stumps to swing a similar delivery between long-on and deep midwicket.

Even Sneh Rana, with all her experience, had no answers for Mandhana's mayhem. RCB ended up hitting at least a boundary in every over, and Mandhana's backing away to loft Rana inside out over wide long-off a statement. She finished with 377 runs in the season, the top scorer of WPL 2026.

"I think she saved one of her best innings for the final," Rangarajan said. "The way she batted was….inhuman? I don't even know the word to use.

"So classy, so elegant…it didn't feel… when you looked at her, you could see that she was in control of what she wanted to do. She was timing the ball, she was hitting, picking the pockets in which she wanted to attack.

"She trained two days prior to the game and we've been having a lot of chat about her batting, how she's feeling and I reckon that her last training session [on Wednesday] was among the best she had batted."

This shift in mindset came about in the final league fixture, with RCB looking to bounce back from two straight losses. While they had already made the playoffs, the top spot and a place in the final was up for grabs against UP Warriorz. Mandhana scored an unbeaten 54 off 27 balls in the successful chase. The knock was significant because she matched her high-tempo approach with consistency, both in shot selection and execution.

"I know she would have loved to have finished the game [in the final as well], but what an innings," Rangarajan said. "We've worked now for four years together. With Smriti, I think both of us know exactly what our roles are within the tournament. So it's very clear between us, good camaraderie, I'd say. I've thoroughly enjoyed working with her and hopefully that continues for RCB for a while now."

Taking us behind the scenes, Rangarajan said Mandhana was a "feels" person in every aspect of her game: in the way she taps the bat, in the way it comes down, in the way it hits the middle.

"She's a nerd when it comes to her batting," Rangarajan said. "I guess that's why she's ended up achieving what she's achieved in life, always looking to improve, always looking to get better at her skill.

"Whenever she's batting, she's like, 'I'm going to try this, I'm going to try that.' A little wide-base, something or the other, Smriti always tries. And I think, luckily and fortunately for us, she cracked the code two days back [against UP Warriorz] and she was very, very comfortable.

"She led the team by example, set the standards in every training session. I'd be doing a disservice even if I tried saying how good Smriti has been in these last months."

It would have been a disservice to say after Thursday's knock that Mandhana didn't turn up in finals. It's likely she would have taken it in her stride as long as she could belt out, "Ee sala kuda cup namdu" at the end of it all.