WPL 2023: UP Warriorz name Australia’s Alyssa Healy as captain for the inaugural WPL season

WPL 2023:For the inaugural match Women’s Premier League, UP Warriorz has chosen the Australian wicketkeeper-batter, Alyssa Healy to lead the team. The inaugural season of the WPL 2023 will be held from March 4 to March 26 in Mumbai. Alyssa is one of the most recognised faces in cricket and is a highly experienced campaigner. She has played a total of 139 matches for Australia in T20Is, scoring close to 2500 runs with one century and 14 fifties. She is also considered to be one of the best wicket-keeper batters in the sport with 110 dismissals in T20Is. Alyssa is among the six overseas players in the UP Warriorz squad and was named the captain ahead of Deepti Sharma.

"The WPL is a tournament we have all been keenly waiting on, and the UP Warriorz has a fantastic squad, waiting to make a splash once things get going," Healy said in a statement issued by Warriorz. "We have a good mix of experience and youth along with the ability and look forward to putting on a show for our fans. We are here to win and be ruthless in our brand of cricket."

Talking about Alyssa, the managing director of Capri Globals who owns UP Warriorz, said, "Alyssa is a giant of the game and has an immense amount of experience at the highest level, and also has the winning habit which we want in our team".

"We hope that the UP Warriorz can make significant strides in this important journey under the leadership of Alyssa Healy, and go on to be a source of joy and inspiration for the women of UP."

The five other overseas players in the Warriors squad are Sophie Ecclestone, Tahlia McGrath, Shabnim Ismail, Grace Harris and Lauren Bell. Some of the prominent Indian players in the squad include Deepti Sharma, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Devika Vaidya, Anjali Sarvai and Kiran Navgire. The Warriorz will be coached by England’s Jon Lewis with Anuj Jain as the assistant coast and Ashley Noffke as the bowling coach. World Cup winner Lisa Sthalekar will be the team mentor.

UP Warriorz squad: Alyssa Healy (capt), Sophie Ecclestone, Deepti Sharma, Tahlia McGrath, Shabnim Ismail, Anjali Sarvani, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Parshavi Chopra, Shweta Sehrawat, S Yashasri, Kiran Navgire, Grace Harris, Devika Vaidya, Lauren Bell, Laxmi Yadav, Simran Shaikh.

UP Warriors will begin their WPL campaign on Sunday, March 5 against Gujarat Titans at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai. Each of the five teams will play the other teams twice for eight league matches before the Eliminator will be played between the teams that finished second and third. The winner of the Eliminator will play the table-topper in the final on March 26 at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai.