Dubai : The much-awaited, Women’s T20 Challenger, commonly known as women’s mini IPL, will take place in the United Arab Emirates from November 4 to 9, a senior IPL official confirmed the development on Wednesday (September 30).
Women’s cricket in India has come to a topical pause because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Though BCCI president Sourav Ganguly had consistently maintained that the three-team tournament but there was a lot of criticism directed at the BCCI.
“Yes, the dates of the tournament have been finalised. It will be held from November 4 to 9. There will be a single round-robin league between the three teams Trailblazers, Velocity and Supernovas along with the final. In all four matches will be held,” a senior IPL development official told PTI on conditions of anonymity.
“The final has been slotted on November 9 as we didn’t want to schedule on the day of the men’s final. There is enormous interest in the women’s event and its only commercially prudent that it is separated from men’s event,” the official said.
Only last week, the BCCI has announced the new women selection panel under former left-arm spinner Neetu David, which has now been arrayed to pick the three squads. It is expected that the teams will be flying to the UAE by the second week of October and will undergo a six-day mandatory quarantine period due to the Coronavirus on arrival unless the health safety rules change further. “The girls haven’t had training for such a long time and they would need to be given adequate time for net practice,” the source said.
Top players from Australia and England will not be available due to the Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL), where they have already signed prior contracts. So, it is expected that all three teams will have more Indian girls this season considering the fact that for health safety reasons, teams need to sustain more players.
The dates of WBBL are colliding with Women’s Challengers. Three Indian players Shafali Verma, Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur were expected to feature in WBBL but now they will not be a part of the women’s franchise league. The four matches are likely to be held in Sharjah or Dubai considering that Abu Dhabi has different quarantine rules.
