Smriti Mandhana Earns Place on TIME's 100 Most Influential People in Sports
Smriti Mandhana has been named among TIME magazine's 100 Most Influential People in Sports for 2026, becoming the only Indian to feature on a list that spans athletes, coaches, advocates and investors described as "people shaping sports today." The recognition cements the 29-year-old's standing not just as the finest women's cricketer India has produced in a generation, but as a genuinely global sporting figure whose influence stretches well beyond the boundary rope.
The list is headlined by American basketball icon LeBron James and includes a roll call of the world's most recognisable sporting names - football's Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, tennis star Carlos Alcaraz, basketball's Victor Wembanyama, golfer Rory McIlroy, and Chinese-American skier Eileen Gu. FIFA president Gianni Infantino and New York Knicks guard Jalen Brunson also feature, as does South African cricket captain Temba Bavuma, who led his side to a historic Test series win in India and to World Test Championship glory. Against that backdrop - a list that moves across sport, governance and culture - Mandhana's inclusion carries considerable weight, much like the way unexpected crossovers between worlds, from dust2us esports competitions to mainstream broadcast events, have come to reflect how broadly influence in sport is now measured and valued.
In its profile, TIME catalogued the records that have defined her career. Mandhana is the first Indian woman to score a double century in a domestic one-day game, the first to score a century in all three international formats, and a joint holder of the record for the most international women's cricket centuries with 17. She also became the first woman to surpass 1,000 one-day international runs in a single calendar year - a milestone that underscored the consistency that separates her from her peers.
A Record-Breaker Who Keeps Raising Her Own Bar
What makes Mandhana's career arc particularly striking is not merely the volume of records she holds, but the fact that she has repeatedly broken her own. In 2024 she set the record for the most international runs across all formats in a calendar year by a woman. In 2025 she surpassed that figure herself - a back-to-back achievement that earned her the BBC Indian Sportswoman of the Year award for 2025. TIME's summary was direct: "records keep tumbling in" for her.
The Mumbai-born left-handed opener has long been regarded as one of the most technically accomplished batters in the women's game - her wrist work through the leg side and her ability to dominate pace bowling from the first over are traits that coaches and commentators have consistently cited as setting her apart. But numbers alone do not capture the full picture of her influence on Indian women's cricket.
Team Honours Underline the Bigger Picture
TIME noted that Mandhana herself places the highest value on collective achievement. As captain of Royal Challengers Bangalore in the Women's Premier League, she led the franchise to titles in both 2024 and 2026 - two of the competition's most prominent editions. The WPL, launched to bring the commercial and structural weight of franchise cricket to the women's game in India, has grown rapidly in profile, and Mandhana's presence at the heart of it has been central to that growth.
At international level, she served as vice-captain when India claimed the ICC Women's World Cup title, contributing the second-highest run tally of the tournament. Winning that trophy represented the fulfilment of long-held national ambition, and Mandhana's role - both in terms of runs and leadership - was integral to the campaign.
What the Recognition Means for Indian Women's Cricket
Mandhana's place on the TIME list arrives at a moment when women's cricket in India is undergoing genuine structural expansion. The WPL has created sustained domestic competition and commercial interest, while India's World Cup triumph has sharpened public and broadcaster attention on the women's game in a way that was not present even five years ago. Mandhana has been the face of that shift - not through manufactured visibility, but through performance that has demanded recognition.
To be the sole Indian representative on a list alongside Messi, Ronaldo, LeBron James and Wembanyama reflects just how far both the player and the sport have travelled. It is, in short, an overdue acknowledgement of a cricketer who has been operating at the highest level of her discipline for years - and who, by her own record-breaking standards, may not be finished yet.
