The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is slowly closing out on finalizing its roadmap to get the inaugural edition of the Women’s Indian Premier League (W-IPL) underway. The moving month for developments regarding the tournament is here and early in the month, there’ve come a few keenly awaited details.
Tournament time frame :
Ever since the BCCI cleared its intentions regarding the conduct of the Women’s IPL, fans have actively been speculating a lot about the conduct of the tournament from franchises to venues to date. While a lot is yet unknown, there’s reportedly a development on the time frame of the tournament as it’s understood to be played from the 3rd to the 26th of March.
The BCCI is yet to formalize the dates, but it’s learned that the board has decided on a window for the W-IPL and that’s a week after the 2023 Women’s T20 World Cup, which is scheduled to be played early next year in South Africa from the 10th to the 26th of February. With the Final scheduled for the 26th, the tournament will likely get underway on the 3rd of March.
Tender :
The BCCI has also announced the media-rights tender for the first 5 seasons of the Women’s IPL, 2023 to 2027. While the last date for picking up the tender is December 31, 2022, it is understood that the bids will be opened till around the 8th of January. Another u-turn from the BCCI sees them now switch to the closed-bid process instead of an e-auction that initially was on the cards.
While further details will emerge once the bidders pick up the tender document, it has been understood that the BCCI has not set any base price for each of the three categories for which rights are to be sold, namely; television, digital, and a combination of the two.
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Women’s IPL is likely to be played from March 3 to 26 in India.
Source: ESPN Cricinfo #CricketTwitter pic.twitter.com/XbtdtDdBJY
— Female Cricket (@imfemalecricket) December 9, 2022
Reactions :
A few of India’s best recently shared their views on the conduct of the Women’s Indian Premier League (W-IPL) and their statements are mentioned below.
India all-format skipper, Harmanpreet Kaur recently when was on the Star Sports show, ‘Follow the Blues’, on the conduct of the Women’s IPL, said, “The IPL will be a great platform for players that are really good, but you know for them, international cricket is still something that they cannot change their approach and mindset overnight. But in the IPL, when they get a chance to play against overseas players, it will give them a platform, they can play well, they can understand what is international cricket.”
Harmanpreet’s deputy, Smriti Mandhana, said, “All of the women’s cricket, I won’t say the Indian team or the domestic set-up. We keep talking about how it will increase the bench strength. Grassroot wise and we have seen how the Big Bash and The Hundred have helped Australia and England respectively in their domestic set-up as well as other things.”
Power striker, Jemimah Rodrigues said, “The women’s IPL is going to change a lot of things for women’s cricket in India. I think this is like the best platform for us now that we as an Indian team have been doing so well in all the major events like the World Cup, the Commonwealth. I am very sure that women’s cricket in India is all set to go to the next level after the women’s IPL.
(Inputs sourced from Nagraj Gollapudi’s publication for ESPN Cricinfo and quotes sourced from The Indian Express)
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