After Lauren Bell, England captain Heather Knight withdraws from WPL 2024; RCB name replacement

Heather Knight withdrew her name from the upcoming Women’s Premier League 2024 on Saturday, January 27. Royal Challengers Bangalore introduced South African star Nadine de Klerk as a replacement for Knight for the second version of the event beginning on February 23.

Knight, 33, will be a part of younger pacer Lauren Bell who additionally withdrew from the cash-rich league on Friday. England girls’s cricket staff is scheduled to journey to New Zealand for the white-ball sequence in March-April and the England and Wales Cricket Board has reportedly requested the gamers to decide on between nationwide duties and WPL.  

The legendary batting all-rounder struggled to make an influence with a bat in WPL 2023 however impressed with a ball. She featured in all eight innings for the Bangalore-based franchise the place she scored 135 runs at a strike price of 140.62 and took 4 wickets in 4 innings.

Nadine, the 24-year-old tempo all-rounder, went unsold within the WPL participant public sale final month. She has featured in 46 T20I matches for the Proteas Women since making her debut in 2018 and can be part of the continuing multi-form tour of Australia. 

Meanwhile, Smriti Mandhana-led RCB will certainly miss a participant of Knight’s stature however have some high quality choices within the staff for the second version of the event. Apart from star batters Sophie Devine and Ellyse Perry, the staff additional improved their squad by signing Georgia Wareham, Kate Cross and Sophie Molineux within the current public sale. 

Bangalore completed the opening version within the fourth place in a five-team event with simply two wins in eight video games. The likes of Smriti Mandhana and Ellyse Perry struggled to fulfil followers’ expectations and might be trying ahead to improved performances within the upcoming season. 

RCB’s up to date squad: Smriti Mandhana (c), Sophie Devine, Ellyse Perry, Indrani Roy, Kanika Ahuja, Asha Shobana, Disha Kasat, Renuka Singh, Richa Ghosh, Shreyanka Patil, Georgia Wareham, Kate Cross, Ekta Bisht, Shubha Satheesh, S Meghana, Simran Bahadur, Sophie Molineux, Nadine de Klerk.