[ᴡᴘʟ] Women's Premier League (Feb 23 to Mar 17, 2024)

[WubbaLubbaDubDub]

Crowds are good on account of the caravan model. Adding too many franchisees might not work right now. The league needs to mature and stand alone on its own for 3 seasons atleast, before once can even think of adding or swapping teams.

Agree to this 100%. Its same like MLC, keep it small, keep it precise. Build on the league and its success for atleast 3-5 seasons before increasing # of matches and adding franchises.

 

[Viper.]

One thing I've always wanted to talk about was MI Women's superb strategy at the inaugural auction which helped them win last year and do well now too. They bought a team with a bunch of good overseas ARs, but the Indian core looked inexperienced outside Harman, Yastika and Vastrakar- where everyone else was uncapped and unknown. It didnt look so strong, at first

But If you noticed, among Top 5 wicket takers last year, 4 were from MI- Hayley Matthews, Saika Ishaque, Issy Wong and Amelia Kerr.

Of these 2, Matthews and Kerr are also among their top batters, alongside Sciver, Harman and Yastika. Plus Sciver is also one of their 5 main bowlers.

3 of their 5 main bowlers are also 3 of their 5 main batters and that is something really incredible. They have basically 3 Shakibs in theri side- Kerr, Sciver and Matthews. None of their uncapped Indian bowlers except Saika Ishaque had to bowl at all in an ideal 5-bowler strategy and they even had Pooja Vastrakar as 6th option. Saika Ishaque was an uncapped bowler yes, but she clicked and just her performance out of all the uncapped Indians was enough as MI relied on the overseas stars for basically all of the other overs.

They are using the triple-Kallis strategy to basically run the team, with only 2-3 good specialist bats or bowlers otherwise, and 2-3 uncapped Indians literally playing specialist fielder role. And the thing is, this is near impossible in Men's Cricket- we don't have players who are genuinely good enough to carry both batting and bowling- only Shakib and de Leede are comparable. Women's Cricket's surplus of all-rounders who can make the team on their batting/bowling alone makes this a very viable strategy for both Internationals and leagues, and it's probably gonna be unique to only Womens Cricket

Meanwhile DC went orthodox and bought an actually good team of 11 renowned players but still could only finish 2nd to MI who just threw 3 mini Jacques Kallis/Shakib players into the field and they destroyed every team with both bat and ball (Of course, they had to be quality all-rounders)

Post automatically merged: Mar 2, 2024

It's just really smart- Hayley Matthews can be in the team as a batter alone, she can be there as a bowler alone. Same for Amelia Kerr. MI buying them literally meant they could leave very little money to spend on others as their role is to do most of the work with both bat and ball

 

[Till Valhalla]

One thing I've always wanted to talk about was MI Women's superb strategy at the inaugural auction which helped them win last year and do well now too. They bought a team with a bunch of good overseas ARs, but the Indian core looked inexperienced outside Harman, Yastika and Vastrakar- where everyone else was uncapped and unknown. It didnt look so strong, at first

But If you noticed, among Top 5 wicket takers last year, 4 were from MI- Hayley Matthews, Saika Ishaque, Issy Wong and Amelia Kerr.

Of these 2, Matthews and Kerr are also among their top batters, alongside Sciver, Harman and Yastika. Plus Sciver is also one of their 5 main bowlers.

3 of their 5 main bowlers are also 3 of their 5 main batters and that is something really incredible. They have basically 3 Shakibs in theri side- Kerr, Sciver and Matthews. None of their uncapped Indian bowlers except Saika Ishaque had to bowl at all in an ideal 5-bowler strategy and they even had Pooja Vastrakar as 6th option. Saika Ishaque was an uncapped bowler yes, but she clicked and just her performance out of all the uncapped Indians was enough as MI relied on the overseas stars for basically all of the other overs.

They are using the triple-Kallis strategy to basically run the team, with only 2-3 good specialist bats or bowlers otherwise, and 2-3 uncapped Indians literally playing specialist fielder role. And the thing is, this is near impossible in Men's Cricket- we don't have players who are genuinely good enough to carry both batting and bowling- only Shakib and de Leede are comparable. Women's Cricket's surplus of all-rounders who can make the team on their batting/bowling alone makes this a very viable strategy for both Internationals and leagues, and it's probably gonna be unique to only Womens Cricket

Meanwhile DC went orthodox and bought an actually good team of 11 renowned players but still could only finish 2nd to MI who just threw 3 mini Jacques Kallis/Shakib players into the field and they destroyed every team with both bat and ball (Of course, they had to be quality all-rounders)

Post automatically merged: Mar 2, 2024

It's just really smart- Hayley Matthews can be in the team as a batter alone, she can be there as a bowler alone. Same for Amelia Kerr. MI buying them literally meant they could leave very little money to spend on others as their role is to do most of the work with both bat and ball

Tldr
Ambani money buys trophies!

 

[wasteyouryouth]

One thing I've always wanted to talk about was MI Women's superb strategy at the inaugural auction which helped them win last year and do well now too. They bought a team with a bunch of good overseas ARs, but the Indian core looked inexperienced outside Harman, Yastika and Vastrakar- where everyone else was uncapped and unknown. It didnt look so strong, at first

But If you noticed, among Top 5 wicket takers last year, 4 were from MI- Hayley Matthews, Saika Ishaque, Issy Wong and Amelia Kerr.

Of these 2, Matthews and Kerr are also among their top batters, alongside Sciver, Harman and Yastika. Plus Sciver is also one of their 5 main bowlers.

3 of their 5 main bowlers are also 3 of their 5 main batters and that is something really incredible. They have basically 3 Shakibs in theri side- Kerr, Sciver and Matthews. None of their uncapped Indian bowlers except Saika Ishaque had to bowl at all in an ideal 5-bowler strategy and they even had Pooja Vastrakar as 6th option. Saika Ishaque was an uncapped bowler yes, but she clicked and just her performance out of all the uncapped Indians was enough as MI relied on the overseas stars for basically all of the other overs.

They are using the triple-Kallis strategy to basically run the team, with only 2-3 good specialist bats or bowlers otherwise, and 2-3 uncapped Indians literally playing specialist fielder role. And the thing is, this is near impossible in Men's Cricket- we don't have players who are genuinely good enough to carry both batting and bowling- only Shakib and de Leede are comparable. Women's Cricket's surplus of all-rounders who can make the team on their batting/bowling alone makes this a very viable strategy for both Internationals and leagues, and it's probably gonna be unique to only Womens Cricket

Meanwhile DC went orthodox and bought an actually good team of 11 renowned players but still could only finish 2nd to MI who just threw 3 mini Jacques Kallis/Shakib players into the field and they destroyed every team with both bat and ball (Of course, they had to be quality all-rounders)

Post automatically merged: Mar 2, 2024

It's just really smart- Hayley Matthews can be in the team as a batter alone, she can be there as a bowler alone. Same for Amelia Kerr. MI buying them literally meant they could leave very little money to spend on others as their role is to do most of the work with both bat and ball

cc : @Till Valhalla TLDR 'Ambani money buys trophies'

It's not that surprising that the best teams have the strongest Indian players. If I was to pick my best Indian XI: RCB have 4 players, MI and DC 2, UPW 2 and GG 1

1​	Shafali Verma	Delhi
2​	Smriti Mandhanna	RCB
3​	Jemimah Rodrigues	Delhi
4​	Harmanpreet Kaur	Mumbai
5​	Richa Ghosh	RCB
6​	Deepti Sharma	UPW
7​	Pooja Vastrakar	Mumbai
8​	Shreyanka Patil	RCB
9​	Sneh Rana	GG
10​	Rajeshwari Gayakwad	UPW
11​	Renuka Singh	RCB

The five best batters are in just three teams. GG have one of the best all rounders in Deepti but she's not a great T20 batter and hasn't performed yet with the ball this season. Gayakwad and Sneh Rana didn't play in the recent series against Australia and England but are the leading players for their franchises.

Outside of that XI, Harleen Deol and Yastika Bhatia might get in that side, depending on how much batting you want, but neither are particularly established internationals in the format. Titas Sadhu looked like the best pace bowler, aside from Renuka recently. She can't even get in the DC side right now. I could see her coming in for Shikha Pandey though.

I'd say RCB probably have the strongest domestic players: Mandhana, Ghosh, Renuka, Shreyanka, Meghana, Asha but Mumbai definitely bought the best in terms of overseas players. Getting Ismail after UP released her, was a real coup but also shows there just seems to be a clearer strategy in how they want their team to set up. An upgrade on Issy Wong as a bowler. She was excellent last year but had a woeful 12 months, she still has huge potential and improves the batting too when she does play.

Delhi have the best spread of internationals, leading players, experienced players and upcoming players. But I think while they have solid overseas players they aren't perhaps in the quite as consistent or strong as Mumbai.

UP Warriorz best domestic batter is probably Navgire who has had a brief chance at international level. They've perhaps found a good role for her as an really aggressive opener. Athapaththu getting picked makes sense, McGrath has looked out of touch, but that leaves them with no overseas pacer. The domestic batting being weak was why they had to pick Grace Harris last year ahead of Shabnim Ismail and probably why they let Ismail go. At the moment they look very reliant on Eccelstone, and bizarrely she seems to be batting quite low. She's batted twice, at 9th, where she's batted at 7 for England. Weird with the England coach being UP coach.

Gujarat are really short on top quality domestic players. Gurajat's best domestic batter is Harleen Deol who is probably as good as RCB's third best (Meghana who GG let go) I'm a fan of Sneh Rana but I would call her a fringe player at international level, like Meghna Singh. Then they have Hemalatha and Kashyap who are, perhaps, in the upcoming international player category. Veda Krishnumurthy is experienced but not someone who is likely to add a great deal in T20 cricket. Tanuja Kanwar is someone I could see playing for India in the future and is perhaps the best performing Indian player they've had but that says a lot about their side if an uncapped player is out performing players with national team experience.

It looks fairly similar to last year in that Mumbai look the best side if their internationals perform with DC second best. RCB with Smriti and Renuka performing better this year look as good on the pitch as they do on paper compared with last season.

A lot can be made of the Ambani money or whatever, but, I do think, Charlotte Edwards as coach makes a big difference.

 

[Bevab]

The Ambani money does get you a good coach like Edwards.

The Ambanis are also shrewd cricket owners for the most part with how they place their trust in clear structural organisations and key individuals in vital roles. It’s no coincidence that Gujarat’s team is in shambles meanwhile considering who their owner is.

 

[Till Valhalla]

Charlotte Edwards

Ambani money is the reason she is the coach

 

[pillowprocter]

1​	Shafali Verma	Delhi
2​	Smriti Mandhanna	RCB
3​	Jemimah Rodrigues	Delhi
4​	Harmanpreet Kaur	Mumbai
5​	Richa Ghosh	RCB
6​	Deepti Sharma	UPW
7​	Pooja Vastrakar	Mumbai
8​	Shreyanka Patil	RCB
9​	Sneh Rana	GG
10​	Rajeshwari Gayakwad	UPW
11​	Renuka Singh	RCB

Have they ever gone for 5 spinners and 1 seamer tho?

 

[wasteyouryouth]

Have they ever gone for 5 spinners and 1 seamer tho?

It's just a hypothetical team of the best/established internationals off the top of my head. It just happens to be XI.

 

[Viper.]

It's just a hypothetical team of the best/established internationals off the top of my head. It just happens to be XI.

you forgot Radha Yadav

 

[wasteyouryouth]

you forgot Radha Yadav

I was thinking more broadly, she's only played 1 ODI and she's not been in the T20 side for 12 months.

I could take out Shreyanka, Sneh and Gayakwad from that list for various reasons. Shreyanka wasn't an international when she was signed and the other two are not necessarily definite picks for every team but had played consistently.

It's really just illustrative, whether it's 11 or 8 players, of how UP and GG somehow missed out.

 

[Viper.]

I was thinking more broadly, she's only played 1 ODI and she's not been in the T20 side for 12 months.

I could take out Shreyanka, Sneh and Gayakwad from that list for various reasons. Shreyanka wasn't an international when she was signed and the other two are not necessarily definite picks for every team but had played consistently.

It's really just illustrative, whether it's 11 or 8 players, of how UP and GG somehow missed out.

Oh what, really??

I knew I wasnt a follower of women's cricket too much, but I guess I'm terribly out of the loop.

I always thought our attack was Renuka, Radha and Gayakwad... but I guess a year has passed too quickly

Post automatically merged: Mar 2, 2024

And true, I didnt remember Shreyanka Patil in the ICT before WPL began. Players like her and Saika Ishaque got India debuts due to the WPL. It's great to have it produce more talents for India in women's cricket too

 

[wasteyouryouth]

Oh what, really??

I knew I wasnt a follower of women's cricket too much, but I guess I'm terribly out of the loop.

I always thought our attack was Renuka, Radha and Gayakwad... but I guess a year has passed too quickly

Post automatically merged: Mar 2, 2024

And true, I didnt remember Shreyanka Patil in the ICT before WPL began. Players like her and Saika Ishaque got India debuts due to the WPL. It's great to have it produce more talents for India in women's cricket too

Radha was certainly a regular, maybe she had an injury for the matches recently but I think Shreyanka may have taken her place. A few other players have had chances too.

I had a longer list including 'fringe' players, those that have had chances but might be the main picks across formats, like her, Harleen and Yastika. It wasn't a deep dive just thinking about what I'd seen in the last year.

It would be easier to say, if there were a list of the ten best internationals (removing Shreyanka as a bit of an unknown at time of the first auction) if there was a draft you'd see UP and Gujarat with at least one of the best of batters.

 

[Bigby Wolf]

First game watching this season.

Great batting by Smriti Mandhana and Elyse Perry.

 

[Bigby Wolf]

Elyse Perry just smashed the window of that sponsored car lol.

 

[Bigby Wolf]