Follow UsYastika Bhatia joined Jemimah Rodrigues and Shikha Pandey as the only three Indians named in the Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL) draft for the 2025-26 season. Her name was announced in the additional list of draft-nominated players on June 12 (Thursday) by Cricket Australia, the parent body of the Big Bash League (BBL) and WBBL.
All three were part of WBBL 2024-25 with the other three being Dayalan Hemalatha, Deepti Sharma and Smriti Mandhana. However, so far, there is no mention of the other three.
Although the names of the pre-signed players are not available so far, it would be shocking if Shafali Verma, after an improved showing in the Women’s Premier League (WPL) 2025, fails to get drafted or pre-signed.
Amongst the men’s players, Usama Mir of Pakistan joined a long list of Pakistan players headed by Shaheen Afridi in the BBL draft.
The player draft will take place on June 19 with the WBBL draft starting the four-round procedure. The BBL draft will follow that.
Apart from the players, either fresh signees or the retained ones will be joined by pre-draft signings to form the squads of the eight BBL and WBBL teams.