WPL 2023 Auction: Women Premier League is about to get underway but not without controversy. Some of the former and current players are not happy with BCCI setting a meagre Rs 12 Crore auction purse. One of the prominent names among them is former BCCI Committee of Administration (CoA) member Diana Edulji. She has lashed out at the BCCI for undermining women’s cricketers. Edulji has said that the amount is too little and will prevent someone like Smriti Mandhana from even crossing Rs 5 Cr threshold at the auction. For comparison, the auction purse was set at Rs 20 Cr for the inaugural Men’s IPL auction in 2008. Follow WPL Auction LIVE Updates on InsideSport.IN.
“It’s going to be a very good auction but the only thing I feel that the purse is a bit too small. For someone going very high, it will be very difficult because you have to build a team in the first year,” Edulji told India.com.
WPL 2023 Auction: Before AUCTION, BIG controversy in Women Premier League, ex-players upset, say ’12 Cr salary purse too little’
With the likes of Mandhana, Harmanpreet Kaur or Tahlia McGrath commanding great respect as hard-hitters, they could have broken Rs 5-6 Cr barrier. But now with the purse constraints, it will not be possible. For Rs 12 Cr, one team has to pick a minimum of 15 players for the roster. Hence, the chance of someone going for a high price is almost null.
“With Rs 12 crores, I don’t know how it’s going to be. It’s going to be a very tricky auction. I would say it should have been within Rs 20-25 crores. But 12 crores is a bit too little I think for really getting good players, especially when you are getting the foreigners coming in and also with the top Indian players in the mix,” Edulji said.
In comparison, Sam Curran was sold for Rs 18.5 Cr alone at the recently concluded IPL 2023 Auction.
“It’s going to be awkward … some people are going to get picked up, some won’t, and you’re going to get a value attached to what you’re worth, which as human beings isn’t the nicest thing, but it’s also a job and it’s what we’ve put our names in for,” New Zealand captain Devine told reporters in Cape Town on Saturday.
WPL 2023 Auction: Before AUCTION, BIG controversy in Women Premier League, ex-players upset, say ’12 Cr salary purse too little’
WPL Players Auction
- Despite discussions about a player draft, the BCCI will conduct an IPL-style auction instead.
- The players’ base prices will be in three groups of Rs 50, 40, and 20 lahks.
- Uncapped players will be in Rs. 10 lahks and Rs. 20 lakh base price categories.
- A total of 150 players will be in auction pool.
- Each of the five teams will have a wage cap of Rs 12 crore.
- The BCCI has allowed for 5 international players to join the starting XI.
- But one of the five must be from an associate country.
WPL 2023 Auction: Before AUCTION, BIG controversy in Women Premier League, ex-players upset, say ’12 Cr salary purse too little’
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