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'Deepti Sharma should have been made captain': Former IND skipper wants home players to lead teams in WPL
Out of the five teams in the WPL, only two sides have gone with Indian captains while the rest are being led by Australians.
The Women's Premier League (WPL) gets underway on Saturday with a match between the Gujarat Giants and the Mumbai Indians at the DY Patil Stadium. The auction for the season was held on February 13 in which a total of 87 players were sold and ₹59,50,00,000 was splurged collectively amongst the five franchises. India's Smriti Mandhana, who was the first player to go under the hammer in the auction, was also the most expensive at ₹3.40 Crore which the Royal Challengers Bangalore spent. Australia’s Ashleigh Gardner and England’s Natalie Sciver-Brunt emerged as the most expensive overseas players.
Out of the five teams, just two - Mumbai Indians and RCB, have opted to go for Indian captains. Harmanpreet Kaur leads MI while Smriti Mandhana is captain of RCB. The rest of the teams have chosen Australian players as their captain with Meg Lanning leading the Delhi Capitals, Beth Mooney leading Gujarat Giants and Alyssa Healy leading UP Warriorz. Former India skipper Anjum Chopra has said that she would have liked to see more Indians leading the WPL teams.
"I didn't like that most of the teams have opted for foreign players as captains because it's an Indian league and will be played in Indian conditions, so Indian players should have been captains if they have capabilities. I thought Deepti Sharma should have been made the captain as she led in the last Women's T20 Challenge," Chopra, who is a Chopra, WPL Expert for Sports18 and JioCinema, said in a virtual interaction. Chopra, however, agreed that six-time T20 World Cup winners Australia have more experienced players compared to India.
"Australian players are world champions and they have the experience of leading sides back home. I completely agree with their (Australian players) experience (at the international stage), and so Jemimah Rodrigues can't become a captain ahead of Meg Lanning in the same team (Delhi Capitals). If I look at the big picture, the Indian players don't have much captaincy potential like Australian players," she said.
