Veteran stars of the Indian women's cricket team Mithali Raj and Jhulan Goswami will be rested for the upcoming Women's T20 Challenge, which is slated to take place from May 23 to 28 at the Mumbai Cricket Association Stadium in Pune. The tournament will also act as an opportunity to showcase up and coming talents in the sport of cricket, all of whom will get a chance to display their prowess at the premier competition.
Sources informed Sports Tak, "This time we have given rest to senior players like Mithali Raj and Jhulan Goswami, and have selected new faces from the domestic circuit to play in this tournament. We wanted to give chances to new faces that's why we came to this decision."
The sources also said that the BCCI have chosen their captains for the three teams that will be participating in the Tournament. Trailblazers will be led by Smriti Mandhana, Harmanpreet Kaur will take charge of the Supernovas and Deepti Sharma will captain the Velocity side.
Earlier, it was announced that England captain Heather Knight, world number one bowler Sophie Ecclestone and Australian leg-spinner Alana King will be among 12 foreign players who are set to take part in the Women's T20 Challenge. The Women's Challenge did not take place last year and the upcoming edition is expected to be the last one with the BCCI planning a full-fledged Women's IPL from next year.
Meanwhile, the BCCI officially announced the squads for the tournament. The All-India Women’s Selection Committee picked the three squads - each comprising a total of 16 members.
Here are the squads for the upcoming Women's T20 Challenge:
(* represents foreigners in the squads)
| Supernovas | Trailblazers | Velocity |
| Harmanpreet Kaur (C) | Smriti Mandhana (C) | Deepti Sharma (C) |
| Taniya Bhatia (VC) | Poonam Yadav (VC) | Sneh Rana (VC) |
| *Alana King | Arundhati Reddy | Shafali Verma |
| Ayush Soni | *Hayley Matthews | *Ayabonga Khaka |
| Chandu V | Jemimah Rodrigues | K.P.Navgire |
| *Deandra Dottin | Priyanka Priyadarshini | *Kathryn Cross |
| Harleen Deol | Rajeshwari Gayakwad | Keerthi James |
| Meghna Singh | Renuka Singh | *Laura Wolvaardt |
| Monica Patel | Richa Ghosh | Maya Sonawane |
| Muskan Malik | S. Meghana | *Natthakan Chantham |
| Pooja Vastrakar | Saiqa Ishaque | Radha Yadav |
| Priya Punia | *Salma Khatun | Aarti Kedar |
| Rashi Kanojia | *Sharmin Akter | Shivali Shinde |
| *Sophie Ecclestone | *Sophia Brown | Simran Bahadur |
| *Suné Luus | Sujata Mallik | Yastika Bhatia |
| Mansi Joshi | S.B.Pokharkar | Pranavi Chandra |
Women's T20 Challenge schedule:
The 2022 Women’s T20 Challenge will begin with the Trailblazers taking on Supernovas in the opening game. The complete schedule is as mentioned below: -
| Date | Time (IST) | Team A | Team B |
| 23-May-22 | 7:30 PM | Trailblazers | Supernovas |
| 24-May-22 | 3:30 PM | Supernovas | Velocity |
| 26-May-22 | 7:30 PM | Velocity | Trailblazers |
| 28-May-22 | 7:30 PM | Final | |
