The Mumbai Indians (MI) have appointed former Australian leg-spinner Kristen Beams as spin bowling coach ahead of the 2026 Women’s Premier League season. She’d join head coach Lisa Keightley and fast-bowling coach Jhulan Goswami in the two-time champions’ dug-out as they aim to defend their title this year.
Beams played one Test, 30 ODIs, and 18 T20Is for Australia, along with 45 appearances in the Women’s Big Bash League, before she moved into coaching. Since then, she has built an extensive coaching résumé, with experience in the WBBL and The Hundred, served as head coach of the Australia Women’s Under-19 team, and held leadership roles as Cricket Australia’s National Development Lead and Community Cricket Manager (South) at Cricket Tasmania.
She also played a key role in Australia’s World Cup success, ending the 2017 ODI World Cup as the tournament’s third-highest wicket-taker.
“It’s my first time back as the coach,” she said in a video statement. “It’s an incredible opportunity to work with someone like a Jhulan Goswami, one of the greats of the game, somebody I played cricket against.”
“Incredible culture. They have developed a winning culture over a really long period of time but [also] a family, that’s what you hear everyone talking about that this group is so tight-knit and it’s a family. It’s what you want to be a part of. I think, as a coach coming in, that’s exactly what you want to be able to do — walk into an environment that feels really tight-knit and a team that knows how to win,” she added.
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MI squad for WPL 2026: Harmanpreet Kaur, Nat Sciver-Brunt, Hayley Matthews, Amanjot Kaur, Kamalini G, Amelia Kerr, Shabnim Ismail, Sanskriti Gupta, Sajana Sajeevan, Rahila Firdous, Nicola Carey, Poonam Khemnar, Triveni Vasistha, Nalla Reddy, Saika Ishaque, and Milly Illingworth.
