New Delhi: Harmanpreet Kaur still can’t quite believe it happened. The 36-year-old skipper keeps greeting her teammates with just two words: “world champion.”
For someone who’s played in four previous World Cup editions carrying memories of close calls and heartbreak, including that painful 2017 final loss to England this victory represents years of chasing a seemingly elusive dream. When Nadine de Klerk’s catch nestled safely in her hands, ending South Africa’s chase and confirming a 52-run victory, everything changed.
“I still can’t believe it,”
Harmanpreet admitted in her conversation with The ICC Review.
“Whenever we see each other, we just say ‘world champion’. It’s a very different feeling. We were waiting so long to feel this way.”
The Night Before: Wisdom from Sachin
The evening before the final brought an unexpected but perfectly timed phone call. Sachin Tendulkar who knows something about World Cup heartbreak and redemption himself reached out to share some guidance with the Indian skipper.
His advice? Keep your balance when the game speeds up.
“Sachin sir called the night before the match,” Harmanpreet revealed.
“He shared his experience and told us when the game is going fast, just slow it down a little. Try and control it because when you go too fast, you can stumble.”
That counsel proved valuable during a final where momentum kept shifting. India posted 298, then watched South Africa build partnerships, before breaking through at crucial moments. Tendulkar’s words about patience and control echoed through those tense passages.
Making History She Can’t Process Yet
The numbers tell a significant story. Harmanpreet became just the third Indian captain to lift a senior World Cup trophy, following Kapil Dev in 1983 and MS Dhoni in 2011. She’s the first Indian woman to achieve this feat. Her team became the first Indian women’s squad to win a World Cup in any format.
But ask her about the magnitude of this achievement, and she struggles to articulate it.
“To be honest, I’m not able to think about this right now,” she confessed. “Maybe I’ll realize after a few months what we’ve achieved, what we’ve given our country. I can’t process this right now.”
She’d discussed this with coach Amol Muzumdar it feels like they’ve won a bilateral series and are heading home, not like they’ve just made history.
The impact is something we’ll realize in a few months. Right now, it just feels like a dream.”
The Players Who Delivered When It Mattered
Harmanpreet saved special praise for three teammates who stepped up magnificently. Shafali Verma’s story particularly stands out. Not originally in the 15-member squad, she came in as injury replacement for Pratika Rawal right before the semi-final.
The team’s faith in her proved justified beyond expectations. In the final, Shafali smashed 87 off 78 balls to power India to 298. Then, when South Africa’s chase was building momentum through Laura Wolvaardt and Sune Luus, Harmanpreet threw her the ball despite Shafali being primarily a batter.
Two balls, two wickets. The partnership was broken.
“We were very clear she was going to play in the final,” Harmanpreet explained. “She’s familiar with pressure and big stages.
When that partnership started building, I thought let’s give her one over and see what happens.
Instantly, she got us two back-to-back breakthroughs. That shows how much she wanted to perform.”
Smriti Mandhana, who finished with 434 runs including a stunning century against New Zealand, received heartfelt acknowledgment.
“Her contribution will always be remembered,” Harmanpreet said. “All of us pray whenever she’s batting. We pray she scores a century because when she gets runs, everything else falls into place.”
Player of the Tournament Deepti Sharma earned praise for her all-round brilliance 22 wickets and 215 runs, including crucial fifties when the innings needed rescuing.
“We’ve been telling Deepti for years she has something special. All she needed was a push to believe in her ability,” Harmanpreet noted.
The Moment with Mithali and Jhulan
Perhaps the most emotionally charged moment came when Harmanpreet invited Mithali Raj and Jhulan Goswami – both on commentary duty at the stadium onto the field to celebrate. These legends had endured near-misses in 2005 and 2017.
“Back in 2022, when we returned after the World Cup, we were really sad knowing it was the last World Cup for Jhulan di and Mithali di,” Harmanpreet recalled.
“Smriti and I decided that whenever we do it in the future, we’d make sure they were in the stadium. We wanted to capture that moment with them.”
The gesture went beyond respect it was completing a journey they’d started together.
Whenever we were dreaming and visualizing, they were with us. We didn’t think of this moment without them.”
For Harmanpreet’s parents watching from the stands, the victory carried special weight.
Since childhood, she’d told them she wanted to wear India’s jersey, play for the country, lead the team, and win the World Cup. Lifting that trophy with them present closed a circle decades in the making.
The captain who once experienced crushing disappointment in World Cup finals now joins an exclusive club of Indian World Cup-winning skippers. And she’s still trying to fully comprehend what that means.
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