S Meghana waited more than five years between India games, and at 30 she has retired from all formats
The Andhra batter played 20 times for India, won Commonwealth Games silver in 2022 and was in RCB’s first WPL title-winning squad.
Oct 24, 2026
S Meghana has retired from all forms of cricket at 30. The Andhra Pradesh batter announced it on Instagram on Friday, four years after her last game for India and eleven months after she went unsold at the WPL auction.
“As I announce my retirement from all formats of cricket as a player, my heart is overflowing with gratitude,” she wrote. “The field has been my second home, teaching me resilience, humility, and giving me memories and friendships that I will carry for a lifetime.”
Twenty games, five years apart
Meghana played 20 times for India: 17 T20Is and three ODIs. What stands out is the gap in the middle. She made her debut as a 20-year-old against West Indies in Vijayawada on 20 November 2016, scoring 17 off 16 balls in a 31-run defeat, and played six T20Is in a fortnight, including four at the Asia Cup in Bangkok. In the final there against Pakistan she was run out for 9, and India won the title.
Her seventh T20I did not come until 9 February 2022 in Queenstown, more than five years later. What got her back was weight of runs. Playing for Railways by then, she finished the 2021-22 Senior Women’s One Day Trophy as its leading scorer with 388 runs, and she went to New Zealand as one of three reserves for the 2022 ODI World Cup.
The ODI debut came in Queenstown on 12 February and went badly, 4 off 14 balls. Three days later she made 49 off 50, and in the next game 61 off 41 with nine fours and two sixes. Those were her only three ODIs. She finished with 114 runs at 38.00.
A medal, then a last game in Sylhet
2022 was her busiest year. She was in the squad that won silver at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games, and her one game there was against Pakistan at Edgbaston, where she made 14. At the Asia Cup in Sylhet that October she opened the batting and made her only T20I fifty, 69 off 53 balls against Malaysia. Her last match for India was against Thailand in Sylhet on 10 October 2022, 20 not out from 18 balls. India went on to win that tournament as well.
Her T20I numbers are modest: 258 runs at a strike rate of 102.78. I don’t think they tell the whole story of a batter who got six games, waited five years, and then had to make her case again in short bursts anywhere from opener to No. 5.
The WPL years
Meghana played the first WPL season for Gujarat Giants in 2023 and then moved to Royal Challengers Bengaluru. She made an impression straight away. Batting at No. 3 against UP Warriorz at the Chinnaswamy in February 2024, she made 53 off 44 balls and added 71 with Richa Ghosh, and RCB won by two runs. She was part of the squad that won RCB’s first WPL title that season. Her last WPL games came in 2025, and no team bid for her at the auction in November that year.
She is not leaving the game entirely. “While my cricket days come to an end, my bond with cricket will never break,” she wrote, adding that she plans to spend her time mentoring the next generation of players.