Royal Challengers Bangalore's triumph - a landmark moment in India's IPL-WPL history

Celebrations erupted and a deafening cheer rang through Arun Jaitley stadium, the Royal Challengers Bangalore women had achieved the unthinkable on March 17, 2024.

Smriti Mandhana's team were crowned champions of the second edition of the Women's Premier League.

This moment in time comes sixteen years after the men's Bangalore team was conceptualised and created for the IPL in 2008.

Since then, three lost finals and several broken hearts later, Mandhana's team seemed to be trodding down the same path.

A dismal inaugural season saw the women finish 4th with just 2 wins from eight outings.

It was a debut season akin to their male counterparts' 2008 opening year.

RCB Men too had finished second to last, grabbing a mere 4 wins out of 10 games.

Immediately, comparisons were drawn up, conclusions were written.

The women's team and its star power amounted to nothing, just like the men.

But there was a woman on a mission, Smriti Mandhana led the charge to script a historic turnaround for Bangalore come 2024.

From Asha Shobana's spin mastery to Shreyanka Patil's purple cap and of course, the evergreen Ellyse Perry, with her iconic 6-wicket haul and her orange cap, each of them played their role to the tee, led by Mandhana, who capped off her season with over 250 runs to her name.

The women were out to prove that despite the men's bumpy record, they were miles ahead. And prove they did.

Their triumph in only the second WPL season nows bears witness to the reasoning that women's cricket deserves the same vigour, the same intensity and the same energy as the men.

And like Mandhana rightly said before the ultimate clash, their performances are not connected to the men and that thoughts like these add to the pressure about all that has transpired in the past 15 years.