Shafali studied Australian batters to fix her one flaw — now she's being called the world's best T20I batter

Shafali Verma couldn't sleep. On Thursday, in the first T20I at Raipur, she'd been dismissed for four — bowled by the same off-spinner Nyasha Gwanzura she'd once carted around parks. It was exactly the kind of soft dismissal that has haunted her career: talented but inconsistent, explosive but fragile. The kind of innings that keeps coaches up at night.

Except this time, it was Shafali who stayed awake.

"After yesterday's match, I can't even sleep, the way I got out in first match," she said in the post-match presentation after the second T20I. "First of all, the way I got out yesterday, against the spinner, as a righty, it's not the correct thing for me."

Two days later, she walked out against Zimbabwe again, found Gwanzura in the first over, and smashed her for a four and a six. Message delivered. The rest of the innings was a 25-ball 55 — six fours, four sixes — that turned a chase of 103 into an 8.5-over procession. India won by nine wickets. Series sealed 2-0.

This is where the story gets interesting. Shafali's response to failure wasn't just anger — it was methodology. During the 2025 off-season, when she was dropped from the ODI squad and had time on her hands, she did something unusual for a batter known more for instinct than intellect: she sat down and studied.

Specifically, she studied the Australians.

"In 2025, when I sat back at home, at that time I just sat and thought about what I could improve," she explained. "Consistency was one of those things and I analysed the Australian batters to see what they were doing."

It's a telling admission. Australian women have set the gold standard for T20I batting consistency for a decade — Alyssa Healy, Beth Mooney, Meg Lanning before her retirement. They don't just hit; they construct. They rotate strike, they build innings in phases, they put a price on their wicket. For a batter who had made her name by walking out and swinging from ball one, studying that discipline was an act of self-awareness.

The results have been staggering. The Shafali of 2024 averaged 22.5 in T20Is with a conversion rate that frustrated selectors. The Shafali of 2026 has 922 runs at a strike rate of 165.52 with 42 sixes — and she bats through innings now, not just through powerplays.

Former India all-rounder Reema Malhotra has been watching this transformation closely, and she's ready to make a big call.

"One major change that we have seen in Shafali's batting is that she is not just a powerplay batter like before," Malhotra told JioStar. "Even after the end of the first six overs, this new version of Shafali bats with responsibility. She has changed her mindset and is putting a price on her wicket. For me, that is the most important thing."

Then the kicker: "In T20I cricket, I would rate her as the number one batter right now."

It's a bold claim, but the numbers back it up. No woman has scored more T20I runs in 2026. No one has hit more sixes. Her strike rate of 165.52 among the top run-scorers is rivalled only by her opening partner Smriti Mandhana (150.1). And unlike previous purple patches, this one has lasted an entire calendar year — across the T20 World Cup, Asia Cup, Asian Games, and now bilateral series.

There's a subplot here that deserves its own headline. Shafali and Mandhana's 96-run opening stand in Raipur made them the first opening pair in T20I cricket — men's or women's — to score 1,000-plus runs together in a single calendar year.

Malhotra sees it as a study in contrasts that works. "Smriti plays the role of the anchor," she said. "Whenever Shafali gets off to a good start with the bat, you immediately see the opposition get on the back foot. She puts that pressure on the bowlers, and the middle order gets the freedom to bat without pressure."

It's a template that India's men have never quite found in T20Is — a genuine strike-and-rotate combination at the top where both batters know their role. Mandhana builds, Shafali detonates, and the other team scrambles.

Malhotra offered one final piece of context that frames what's coming. She called the Zimbabwe series "the semester exams for the Indian team," the upcoming South Africa tour "the pre-boards," and the Women's Champions Trophy "the board exams."

"If they're not consistent, they will be punished, especially in a tournament like the Women's Champions Trophy," she warned.

It's a valid framing. India's women have been bridesmaids too many times in ICC events — runners-up in the 2017 and 2020 T20 World Cups, semi-finalists in 2025. But this version of Shafali — the one who couldn't sleep after a bad dismissal, who studied Australian methods, who bats through innings instead of just blitzing powerplays — might be the difference.

The old Shafali was a six-hitting savant who scared bowlers for six overs. The new Shafali is a 922-run, 42-six, full-innings destroyer who scares them for twenty. That's what studying the Australians will do for you.