Mumbai: UP Warriers (UPW) on Friday appointed former India all -rounder Abhishek Nair as his head coach for the upcoming season of the Women’s Premier League (WPL). After Nair’s appointment, the franchise participated in a manner with its former head coach John Lewis, who was on the hull for the last three sessions.An experienced coach, Nair has been an assistant coach of the Indian team and is currently an assistant coach of Kolkata Knight Riders. He was an assistant coach of KKR when he won his third IPL title in 2024. A staunch Mumbai cricket scored 5749 runs and took 173 wickets in 103 first-class matches between 2005-18, Nayar played three Odis for India in 2009.After his retirement in 2019, the 41 -year -old has played various roles in coaching and has mentioned and guided many top cricketers like India’s ODI captain Rohit Sharma, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul and Dinesh Karthik. While Rohit credited him for his return to IPL 2025, Karthik praised him for his T20 resurrection, enabling him to return to India. Rahul searched Nair for batting sessions around the ground in Mumbai.He was the head coach of the Kolkata Knight Riders Academy in 2018 and then joined the KKR Support Staff as an assistant coach. He was also the head coach of Trinbago Knight Riders (TKR) in CPL in 2022.In July 2024, Nair included Team India as an assistant coach, but had to leave the job for less than a year. He was later recruited as his assistant coach for IPL 2025 by KKR, played the same role from 2018 to 2024 and also ran the KKR Academy.Nair was also the patron of T20 Mumbai League winner Mumbai South Central Maratha Royals this year.Talking about Nair’s appointment, Casemal Weigankar, Cricket UPW COO and Director, told TOI, “As the head coach, Abhishek Nair on board looks like a natural and exciting step for UP Warrier. When a caliber of Abhishek became available, it was a brain without a brain. In Indian cricket, some people bring depth of experience when it comes to shaping players and shaping the winning cultures. He has played an important role in the journey of Rohit Sharma, Dinesh Karthik, and KL Rahul’s choice, as well as promised young talents like Angkarish Raghuvanshi. In the last 18 months alone, Abhishek has been part of three championship winning campaigns-each in a different role, each leaving a permanent impact. ,He said, “We are thrilling him to lead a warrior side, which is united, fearless, and hungry to grow. With Abhishek rudder, we believe that this group can actually do something special,” he said.This is the first time Nair will take charge of a women’s team, although she held a week’s long off-season camp with UPW in Bangalore in August 2023.
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Do you think Abhishek Nair will be able to lead Warries for his first WPL title?
EPW has yet to win the WPL title to win the title that he would expect Nair to end them. The Lucknow-based side made it to the playoffs in the inaugural season in 2023, where he lost to the final champion Mumbai Indians at Eliminator. However, they ended in the second and final of the five teams in WPL in 2024 and 2025 respectively.The UPW was led by WPL 2025 under the leadership of India’s Ace all -rounder Deepti Sharma, when Australian captain Alyssa Heli was dropped from the tournament due to injury.
