The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has announced squads for the upcoming Women’s Challenger series in Indore. The All India Women’s Selection Committee picked the teams which also included the players from the squad which made it to the finals of ICC World Cup earlier this year.
India Blue, India Red and India Green will compete in the tournament which is all set to take place from January 4 to 8.
Anuja Patil, the off-spinning all-rounder who had led India A in successful limited-overs series against a touring Bangladesh A earlier this month, has been handed captaincy responsibilities again. Her Greenside will include Jemimah Rodrigues, Devika Vaidya, Meghna Singh, Preeti Bose and Nuzhat Parween, who had all been a part of the India A series, as well as India seniors Poonam Raut, Shikha Pandey and Ekta Bisht.
Mithali Raj’s Red will have the experience of World Cup finalists Deepti Sharma, Poonam Yadav and Sushma Verma, and India A’s Neha Tanwar.
Smriti Mandhana’s Blue will have the experienced Jhulan Goswami leading her pace attack, with understudies Pooja Vastrakar and Soni Yadav.
Last season, Mandhana had three consecutive half-centuries as her side, the Harmanpreet Kaur-led India Red, won the title.
Kaur and Veda Krishnamurthy are not part of any side this year as they are busy playing in the ongoing season of Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL) in Australia.
Well, all the teams look equally strong and the players would be looking to make the most of the opportunity provided. This tournament will also be important for the players as the Indian team will tour South Africa later in the month for ODI and T20I series.
Here are the squads:
India Blue: Smriti Mandhana (c), VR Vanitha, Mona Meshram, Tanushree Sarkar, Tania Bhatia (wk), D Hemalatha, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Radha Yadav, Jhulan Goswami, Pooja Vastrakar, Soni Yadav, Neenu Choudhary, Pratyusha C
India Red: Mithali Raj (c), Deepti Sharma, Priya Punia, Neha Tanwar, Nishu Choudhary, Sushma Verma (wk), Priyanka Priyadarshani, TP Kanwar, Poonam Yadav, Mansi Joshi, Sukanya Parida, Manali Dakshini, Bharti Fulmali
India Green: Anuja Patil (c), Jemimah Rodrigues, Punam Vaidya, Devika Vaidya, Monikha Das, Nuzhat Parveen (wk), Adila Khanam, Ekta Bisht, Preeti Bose, Shikha Pandey, Meghana Singh, Shannti Kumari, S Asha
Schedule of the Challenger series:
January 4: India Red vs India Blue
January 5: India Green vs India Red
January 6: India Blue vs India Green
January 8: Final
