Smriti Mandhana bats for 6-team women's IPL as men's competition expands

Indian women’s team opener Smriti Mandhana is of the opinion that there is enough talent and depth in Indian women’s cricket for the introduction of a six-team Indian Premier League. She feels that as the IPL has helped in forming a huge pool of players in the Indian men’s circuit, it will also help the women’s national side to improve their bench strength. 

Mandhana, who is one of the most stylish batswomen and a prolific run-scorer going around stated that the quality of domestic players has improved immensely after getting the opportunity to rub shoulders with some of the best in the game. 

"There are same number of states for men and women. So, when they started men's IPL, there were same number of states. But the quality went higher and higher as the years passed by," Mandhana said on Ravichandran Ashwin's YouTube channel.

"What IPL is today, it wasn't the same 10 or 11 years back. I think it's the same for women's cricket. We have same amount of girls playing cricket. For now, I think we will have good five or six teams to start with and probably grow to eight teams in one or two years. But till the time we don't start, we don't know," she added.

Unlike the men’s cricketers, the women’s cricketers are allowed to ply their trade across the globe. Five of the Indian women’s players including Mandhana, Shafali Verma and Harmanpreet Kaur recently plied their trade in the Hundred. 

Mandhana has also been part of the Women’s Big Bash and she hopes that unless the tournament starts, it won’t give enough exposure to the girls to turn their dreams of becoming a cricketer into a reality. 

"Five-six teams, we are good to go with. But eight teams, I am still not sure how it will look like. But I think we really need to start with five or six teams so that we can actually get to eight teams very soon.

"I think till we don't start, we are not giving exposure to our girls to turn their cricket into a really different level," she said.

Mandhana who has played in the Big Bash League feels that the tournament has helped Australia in churning out quality players and has helped their bench strength immensely. Mandhana feels that it can be actually replicated in the Indian circuit as well. 

"I played in Big Bash four years back and now the quality is very different. You can see that in Cricket Australia where they have 40-50 cricketers ready to play international cricket any day."

"So, I really want that to happen in Indian cricket. I think IPL will play a huge role in that," Mandhana concluded.