Two Sri Lanka female cricketers Chamari Atapattu and Shashikala Siriwardene are set to play in the women’s Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 edition, Cricket Age reliably learns.
The Women’s T20 Challenge is set to be held in the United Arab Emirates from November 4-9. The three-team tournament will be played in a round robin league format, along with the final. Overall, four matches will be held with Sharjah as the likely venue. With the Men’s IPL final is slated to be held on November 10, the BCCI has decided to finish off the women’s tournament a day earlier. The players are expected to fly out to the UAE by the second week of October and will undergo a six-day mandatory quarantine period on arrival.
Atapattu, the national women’s skipper, has been the country’s prolific scorer across all formats in women’s cricket over the last several months. Her unbeaten 78 against England in a World Cup preparation match led Sri Lanka to a shock 10-wicket victory. She also scored a quick-fire 50 against Australia in a first round game. Atapattu is the only cricketer in category A.
Siriwardene recently retired from the international cricket. She is the only woman cricketer to take 100 ODI wickets in ODIs for Sri Lanka. Also she is the only woman cricketer to take 100+ wickets as well as to score 1000+ runs in ODI for Sri Lanka. She is a former student of President’s College, Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte.
She was ranked No.6 in the ICC all rounder rankings, ahead of Sri Lanka T20I captain Atapattu, in the weeks before the 2020 T20 World Cup. She is Sri Lanka’s second highest T20I run scorer, 413 runs behind Atapattu. Siriwardene is also Sri Lanka’s leading T20I wicket-taker.
