Yuvraj Singh's advice to Indian women's team ahead of World Cup on home soil: 'Play the situation, not the expectation'

Legendary all-rounder Yuvraj Singh urged the Harmanpreet Kaur-led Indian women’s team to “play the situation” and “experience the whole enigma” in the upcoming ICC Women’s World Cup , where the Women in Blue will be aiming to end their trophy drought in global events.

‘Yuvi’ urges Team India to make most of ‘great opportunity to create history’

Yuvraj, who was part of the Indian team that won the inaugural Men’s T20 World Cup in 2007 as well as the ICC World Cup four years later, urged the Indian women’s team to believe in themselves while adding that “experience and self-belief” will be crucial for them in crunch situations, including and especially in the knockouts.

“(I would say) play the situation and not the expectation and be in the moment,” Yuvraj said at an event marking the 50-day countdown to the 13th edition of the Women’s World Cup, which India will be co-hosting along with Sri Lanka .

“It’s a great opportunity to create history. But that doesn’t mean that from the start point you are thinking of winning it. You have to experience the whole enigma of it. You have to feel that you have put in the process and results will come.”

“But if you want to win the World Cup, you will be in pressure, things won’t go well and that’s when experience and self-belief has to take over. You have to believe that you want to win the game for your country (on) that day,” the flamboyant left-handed batter, who was the Player of the Tournament in the 2011 World Cup, added.

A history of heartbreaks

While they have been crowned Asian champions seven out of nine times, the Women in Blue are yet to win an ICC event – either in the ODI or T20I format. India had finished runners-up in the ODI World Cup in 2005 and in 2017, under Anjum Chopra and Mithali Raj’s leadership respectively.

Harmanpreet, meanwhile, had led the Indians to their only appearance in a T20 World Cup final in Melbourne in 2020.

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While India had been outplayed by Australia in the 2005 ODI World Cup final (98 runs) and in the 2020 Women’s T20 World Cup final (85 runs), they had fallen narrowly short of being crowned world champions in 2017, suffering a nine-run loss at the hands of hosts England despite finding themselves in a winning position at one point.