0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0.
That was how Lauren Bell’s sojourn with Royal Challengers Bengaluru in the fourth season of the Women’s Premier League began. Entrusted with bowling the opening over of the opening game against Mumbai Indians on January 9, the 25-year-old English pacer appeared to have the brand new ball on a string.
On strike was ace all-rounder Amelia Kerr. The New Zealander is usually quick to impose herself with her attacking strokeplay, but on this occasion, she was made to poke and prod for a whole over, uncertain of where a run was going to come from.
Bell went on to work Kerr over meticulously, and had her reward in the third over of her tone-setting first spell when the batter sliced a desperate hoick to Arundhati Reddy at cover. Kerr’s torment was encapsulated by a return of four off 15 deliveries.
Ever since, Bell has rarely deviated from her high standards. Over eight matches in the red-and-black jersey, the six-feet-tall bowler has inexorably homed in on a probing length, forcing top-order batters to feel almost as helpless as Kerr did on that nippy evening.
Bell’s exploits — 12 wickets at a parsimonious economy rate of 5.62 — have gone a long way towards ensuring a second final in four years for RCB. In a format where dot balls are worth their weight in gold, she has delivered as many as 116 out of 192 deliveries. That is equivalent to 19.2 overs of dots, the most by anybody in this tournament.
The stranglehold she has had on opponents stems from her ability to examine techniques by pitching the ball up and extracting swing. Bell’s outswinger to right-handers is particularly deadly. Interestingly, as RCB’s bowling coach Anya Shrubsole observed in a media interaction after the team’s last game, the delivery is a fairly recent addition to Bell’s artillery. When she made her debut for England across all formats in 2022, the booming inswinger was her stock ball.
Tweak in action
The change came about as a result of Bell remodelling her bowling action at the end of her maiden Ashes series in 2023.
“I sat down with my coach and my bowling coach at the time. And we just chatted about how I could progress as a bowler. Obviously, one of my goals is to be one of the best seamers in the world. Basically, there are three parts of fast-bowling: pace, bounce, and movement. My action then didn’t provide the most pace and the most bounce that I could get out of my physicality. So yeah, I just tinkered with my action a bit and tried to get a bit more upright. And in doing so, it led to changing the way I swung the ball,” she said during a virtual media interaction on Monday.
Tinkering with the fundamentals of her action as an international cricketer in the public glare couldn’t have been easy. It is a testimony to her drive to push on and become a better bowler that she took on the challenge.
“It was definitely tricky. It was a tricky maybe six to nine months of my career, but I had the best support I could have asked for at the time,” Bell reflected. “I guess as a young player, I knew that it was for the right reasons and I wanted to push my cricket on. You don’t want to stand still in professional sport because people will take over you. At that point, it was a bit challenging. I was doing it on the international stage as well. I was playing for England at a point where I wasn’t 100%. I’ve come out the other side now, and it was all worth it in the end.”
Favourite dismissal
Besides conventional swing, Bell can also derive movement off the surface. Cast your mind back to the game against Delhi Capitals at the D.Y. Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai on January 17, when she castled Laura Wolvaardt with a peach. The South African batter was shaping up to drive in anticipation of the ball swinging away, but once the white Kookaburra landed on the deck, it seamed in just a fraction and breached the wide gap between bat and pad to clatter the stumps.
Of the 12 wickets in Bell’s locker in this campaign, she savours this more than any other. It merits a place in the highlights reels of the competition.
“The ball that got Wolvaardt,” Bell beamed when asked about her favourite dismissal of the season. “I guess we chatted about the fact that the ball coming back into her is probably her only area of weakness. I got a bit of assistance off the pitch and got it to go back in. So that was a plan that we chatted about pre-game and we managed to execute it out there.”
With Bell proving to be such a force with the new ball, RCB has invariably used up three of her overs in the PowerPlay. When it comes to bringing her back for her fourth and final over, the scenario of the game has tended to dictate skipper Smriti Mandhana’s decision.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s Lauren Bell celebrates with captain Smriti Mandhana after taking the wicket of Gujarat Giants’ Ashleigh Gardner.
| Photo Credit:
PTI
“When I came out here, I don’t think we planned that I was always going to bowl three in the PowerPlay. But it’s been going really well. If you can get on top of teams earlier, it sets you up for the innings really well. So, yeah, we’ve been trying to take wickets in the PowerPlay and really get on top of teams,” Bell elaborated. “And then, I’ve always got one left. It’s normally when we need to break a partnership. Smriti will turn to me and I know my role is to come on and try and take a wicket.”
Synergy with Smriti
In any well-functioning outfit, certainly, the symbiosis between the captain and the spearhead of the bowling unit is absolutely essential. In this case, Bell’s familiarity with Smriti much before their association in the WPL has helped. They were teammates for Southern Brave in The Hundred.
“We knew each other really well before I came here because I’ve obviously played with her. That was more on a personal level and as a friend,” said the youngster from Swindon in southwest England. “And then out here, I’ve obviously got to know her as a captain. She’s been so clear and really backed me, giving me lots of confidence. So yes, we work really well together. Coming here, knowing that I knew my captain obviously settled a few nerves. We’ve got on and we tend to agree on all plans and everything she wants from me. It’s been pretty seamless.”
While Bell’s stint with RCB has indeed been seamless, it does beg the question of why she was not utilised at all by UP Warriorz. She was part of the northern franchise in 2023, but didn’t play a single game.
Puzzling as that seems with the benefit of hindsight, Bell ensured she absorbed valuable lessons from the experience.
“Coming here to India and bowling on these pitches, I trained out here whilst I was with Warriorz. And just experiencing the WPL puts you in a good position,” Bell stated. “Coming back, you kind of know what to expect and what it might be like. I was buzzing to just be there and be part of the squad and experience it all. And I knew that I was going to, once I got home, keep training and hopefully get to a place where I can get picked and have an impact for a team.”
When the opportunity to pick Bell in the auction ahead of the 2026 edition sprung up, RCB seized it without a moment’s hesitation. The coaching staff of the Bengaluru side, of which Shrubsole is now an integral member, was thoroughly convinced about the England pacer’s credentials.
“Looking at the make-up of the Warriorz side, they obviously decided not to go for her. But we were clear coming into this competition that we really wanted an opening bowler who is strong in the PowerPlay,” Shrubsole informed.
“She was the one we ideally wanted. It was always going to go down to auction order and things like that. So luckily, her name came up first and we were able to get her. She’s kind of shown why we were so keen to have her here.”
Yes, of course, she has.
Published – February 03, 2026 11:08 pm IST
