Women’s Premier League : The next big thing in Women’s Cricket

Indian Premier League, the biggest revolution in the history of Indian Cricket that brought glory to hundreds of young Indian cricketers, is set to do the same now for India’s women’s cricketers.

“Yatra Pratibha Avsara Prapnotihi”/ “Where Talent Meets Opportunity.”

Will Women’s IPL justify the tagline just as Men’s IPL has done for the past 15 years ??

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has announced that the inaugural season of the Women’s Premier League (WPL) is likely to be played from March 4 to 26 which will feature 5 teams and the franchises will be unveiled on 25th January.

The BCCI is leaving no stone unturned for the success of the inaugural season of Women’s Premier League. The board recently sold the media rights, for INR 950 crore to Viacom 18 which means the rights for a single game are pegging at a whopping INR 7.09 crore.

What impact will Women’s Premier League have on Indian cricket ??

Indian women’s team reached the finals of the 2019 ODI World Cup but lost the game by just 9 runs. They did exceedingly well to reach the 2020 T20 World Cup final as well but couldn’t lift the trophy as they couldn’t beat the mighty Australian women’s team. In both the finals they succumbed to the pressure of big finals.

The Indian women’s cricketers accepted the fact that they need to learn how to handle pressure in crucial games. The lack of experience of playing in such pressure situations was not helping the team’s cause and that’s where the importance of Women’s IPL was felt.

We’ve already seen the kind of impact Women’s Big Bash League and The Hundred Women’s had on women’s cricket as it made it all the more dynamic and improved the hitting abilities of women’s cricketers and pressure handling as well.

The hype of this mega league is so high that veteran batter Mithali Raj, who’s arguably the greatest Indian women cricketer ever, has kept the option open to come out of her retirement to participate in the inaugural edition of Women’s IPL.

We’ve already seen young players like Shafali Verma and Richa Ghosh who have already set the cricket field on fire at the age of less than 19. Women’s IPL will bring out more of such young and dynamic cricketers to help the Women in Blue to clinch mega ICC events.

So, who’s going to be the next Mithali Raj or the next Jhulan Goswami!!!

Salary Cap, Venue and Prize Money for WPL

The salary cap for the year 2023 has been set at a whopping INR 12 crore. The teams will be allowed to field 5 foreign players in the playing XI. However, one of the foreign players must be from an Associate nation.

The expected venues for the commencement of the inaugural edition of WPL are Brabourne Stadium in South Mumbai and the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai.

The prize money for the league will be INR 10 crore for the players and then for the teams, it will be INR 6 crore for the winning side and INR 3 crore for the runners-up.

All eyes are now set on the WPL auction which will decide the fate of women cricketers across the globe in the cash-rich league.

Smriti Mandhana, Harmanpreet Kaur or Ellyse Perry, who do you think will be the most expensive buy in Women’s IPL auction ??

Do tell me in the comment box….

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