For the Women's Premier League (WPL) 2025 season, the Delhi Capitals (DC) have signed Japanese pacer Ahilya Chandel as a net bowler. Since making her debut in October 2022 against Hong Kong in the Women's East Asia Cup, Chandel, 22, has taken 30 wickets from 32 games at an economy rate of 4.58, making her the all-time top wicket-taker for Japan in Women's T20Is.
The left-arm pacer is one of the four bowlers with a double hat-trick in Women's T20Is. The others are Thipatcha Putthawong of Thailand, Shameelah Mosweu of Botswana, and Anuradha Doddaballapur of Germany. In the 2024 Asian Cricket Council Women's Premier Cup match at the Royal Selangor Club in Kuala Lumpur, Chandel achieved the milestone against China. Ahilya won Player of the Match and helped Japan defeat China by four wickets with bowling figures of 2.5-0-8-4. Ahilya stated that her father inspired her to play international cricket for Japan when she joined DC.
Ahilya on joining DC
"In my cricketing journey so far, I’ve played for Japan, and I also play my cricket way back in Sydney, Australia. I’ve been playing since I was eight years old. I got into cricket because of my dad. My dad’s an Indian, and so he passed that on to me. When he found that Japan had a cricket team, he said why not give it a go? And yeah, since 2022, I’ve made my debut, represented Japan, and now I’m here,” Chandel said in an interview with the Capitals.
Ahilya revealed to have discussed his bowling with Jemimah Rodrigues and made an effort to pick up tips from the world's top bowler.
"I actually had a conversation with Jemi. I spoke to her about my bowling since I’m here as a net bowler, and she gave me a lot of encouragement, reassuring me about my skills, which was really nice. It’s a big opportunity to be playing alongside world-class cricketers. It’s also a good experience to develop my own skills and see how far I am or what the gap is between my level and theirs. When I’m bowling to top-class cricketers, I try to think about how they are thinking and staying a step ahead of them,” Chandel added.