Mooney wants her Gujarat Giants side to take 'brave options' on the field

Having always wanted a women's tournament on the lines of the IPL, Australia batter Beth Mooney was delighted at being picked up by Gujarat Giants at the WPL auction. But a call from former India captain Mithali Raj, Giants' mentor, asking her to be the captain was not something Mooney expected."When I got bid on in the auction, I was just happy to be a part of it and captaincy wasn't something that was on my radar," Mooney said on the eve of the WPL opener against Mumbai Indians at DY Patil Stadium. "Mithali gave me a phone call and said 'we'd like you to do it [captaincy] and we're happy if you want to. So just let us know'. After a couple of conversations with Rachael [Haynes, head coach] after that, we both thought that the time was right for me to challenge myself within cricket."Mooney, who landed in India and joined the squad only on Wednesday, will be captaining at the top level for the first time. She has stood in as a skipper for Queensland Fire in the Women's NCL and for Brisbane Heat in the WBBL, but never captained a T20 side at a higher stage. Giants also have a first-time coach in Haynes, who only retired from all formats after the previous WBBL season. Mooney, who is fresh of a player-of-the-match performance in Australia's sixth Women's T20 World Cup title on Sunday, said she trusted the judgement of her former Australian team-mate and was looking forward to the experience."I know Rachael Haynes quite well [and it is good] to be able to work pretty close with her," she said. "She is in her first ever job as a head coach. I haven't done a lot of captaincy recently but I did a fair bit when I was younger. I have got a little bit of experience. I trust Rach and her judgement and so I was more than happy to help her out."One of the added challenges of captaining a franchise team in the WPL for Mooney will be to know and get the best of the Indian players at Giants' disposal. She had a run through about the squad with Haynes and had inputs from Raj. More importantly, Mooney was firm on instilling the