The Diageo franchise-owned Royal Challengers Bangalore Women (RCB-W) will be one of the five teams participating in the inaugural edition of the Women's Premier League (WPL) 2023. The same franchise also owns the RCB men's team that plays in IPL. WPL will be a full-fledged women's franchise Twenty20 cricket league in India, whose predecessor has been the Women's T20 challenge, played between 2018-2022. WPL 2023 will kick off on March 04 and include 22 fixtures over the course of 23 days. WPL 2023 Schedule: Get Fixtures, Time Table With Venue Details of Women’s Premier League Inaugural Edition.

Royal Challengers Bangalore made the first and biggest purchase at the inaugural auction of WPL. After an intense battle with the Mumbai-based franchise, RCB sealed the record deal of Rs 3.4 Crore with India Women's vice-captain Smriti Mandhana to include her in their popular franchise team. The announcement to make the star opener Smriti Mandhana the first-ever captain of the RCB-W was made public by the franchise on their social media handles lately. The star-studded RCB-W also includes Australia's sensational all-rounder Ellyse Perry and New Zealand Women's skipper Sophie Devine in the squad. The other big buys for RCB were Richa Ghosh, Renuka Singh Thakur and England Women captain Heather Knight, who will be gracing the 18-member squad for RCB-W in the first edition of Women's Premier League. WPL 2023 All Squads: Full Players List of All Women's Premier League Teams After Inaugural Auction.

Royal Challengers Bangalore Match List at Women's Premier League 2023

Date Match Time (IST) Venue
March 5 RCB-W vs DC-W 03:30 PM Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai
March 6 MI-W vs RCB-W 07:30 PM Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai
March 8 GG-W vs RCB-W 07:30 PM Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai
March 10 RCB-W vs UPW-W 07:30 PM Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai
March 13 DC-W vs RCB-W 7:30 PM Dr DY Patil Sports Academy, Mumbai
March 15 UPW-W vs RCB-W 7:30 PM Dr DY Patil Sports Academy, Mumbai
March 18 RCB-W vs GG-W 7:30 PM Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai
March 21 RCB-W vs MI-W 3:30 PM Dr DY Patil Sports Academy, Mumbai

The Bangalore-based Women's team will play their opening match of the first season of WPL against Delhi Capitals Women (DC-W) on March 05 at Brabourne Stadium, Maharashtra. Since the tournament will be played in double round-robin format, RCB-W are scheduled to play eight league matches, two against each of the four remaining teams. Smriti Mandhana-led team will play their last league stage clash on March 21 against hosts Mumbai Indians Women (MI-W) at Dr DY Patil Sports Academy, Navi Mumbai.

RCB-W Squad for WPL 2023

Smriti Mandhana (c), Sophie Devine, Ellyse Perry, Renuka Singh, Richa Ghosh, Erin Burns, Disha Kasat, Indrani Roy, Shreyanka Patil, Kanika Ahuja, Asha Shobana, Heather Knight, Dane van Niekerk, Preeti Bose, Poonam Khemnar, Komal Zanzad, Megan Schutt, Sahana Pawar

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 27, 2023 05:45 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).