Seeing the benefits from and success of the Indian Premier League (IPL) in India, the Board for Control of Cricket in India (BCCI) last year proposed the idea of starting a Women’s Indian Premier League (WIPL) in 2023 to change the face of women’s cricket in India.
When Team India lost the final of the 50-over World Cup to England in 2017, the BCCI decided to start a Women’s T20 Challenge in the year 2018 alongside the IPL just to promote women’s cricket in India. The league started with just two teams, Supernovas and Trailblazers, playing a one-off match with each other.
The next year onwards one more team was introduced, Velocity, making it a three-team league played in the round-robin format and the two table toppers played the final. This league was completely owned and regulated by the BCCI with no privatization involved. This league helped women’s cricket in India grow to an extent but there was a need for a system like the IPL.
The league was to expand in the year 2021 only but wasn’t because of the COVID-19 pandemic. There have been four editions of the Women’s T20 Challenge until now, where the Supernovas have won 3 and the Trailblazers have won 1. The team Velocity which was introduced after the first season is yet to win the Women’s T20 Challenge.
After the conclusion of the 2022 season of the Women’s T20 Challenge, the former BCCI president, Mr. Sourav Ganguly, announced the advent of Women’s IPL from the next year alongside the Men’s IPL.
The IPL which was started in the year 2008 has benefitted men’s cricket to a huge extent and has helped discover some serious cricketing talent in India. Some of the Indian players like Hardik Pandya, Jasprit Bumrah, Rishabh Pant, Sanju Samson, etc. are all gifted by the IPL. It is currently the best domestic T20 league in all over the world.
If we think, we might have gotten late by a year or two in starting the Women’s IPL but nevertheless, it is finally getting started the next year. The BCCI has decided on a roadmap for it the league starting with 5 teams playing the tournament in round robin format. Each team will play the other team twice, making it a total of 20 matches.
The table topper from the league stage will directly reach the final whereas the second-placed and third-placed teams will play an eliminator, and the winner will play the first-place team in the final. The league in its first edition will have a total of 22 matches.
Five overseas players will be allowed in each team (4 from international nations + 1 from associate nations) along with six Indian players in a playing 11. The teams will be allowed a squad of a maximum of 18 players with 6 overseas players.
The BCCI has already released the tender for media rights and the last date to purchase it is 31st December. It will be a closed bidding process where the bids will be disclosed on 8th January 2023. After this, the BCCI will decide how it wants to sell the franchises for the Women’s IPL.
The tentative window decided by the BCCI is from March 3 to March 26, one week after the conclusion of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup. This Women’s IPL is going to help Indian women’s cricket a lot in getting more viewership as well as finding more talent and nurturing the young talent giving them the experience of pressure situations.
