The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) have announced 13-member squads for the two teams, to be led by Harmanpreet Kaur and Smriti Mandhana, which will take part in the Women’s T20 Challenge match on 22 May at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai.

The match, which the BCCI in a statement called a ‘one of its kind’, will be played ahead of Qualifier 1 of the Indian Premier League 2018, reports the ICC.

The two teams – Kaur’s Supernovas and Mandhana’s Trailblazers – will feature some of the best in women’s cricket including the likes of Meg Lanning, Ellyse Perry, Suzie Bates, Jhulan Goswami and India one-day international captain Mithali Raj.

The Trailblazers team includes, among others, Australia wicket-keeper Alyssa Healy and her teammate Beth Mooney, Indian batter Jemima Rodrigues, England’s Danielle Hazell and New Zealand’s Lea Tahuhu, along with Bates, the New Zealand captain.

The Supernovas have Lanning, Perry and Megan Schutt from Australia, Danielle Wyatt from England, New Zealand’s Sophie Devine and Raj.

To get an idea of the quality on offer, Perry, Bates, Lanning and Mandhana are top four batters in the MRF Tyres ICC Women’s ODI rankings, while the corresponding list for bowlers has Schutt at No.2 and Goswami at No.5.

As for the Twenty20 International rankings, Bates, Lanning and Mooney are No.2, 3 and 4 among batters respectively, while Schutt is right on top of the chart for bowlers.

The exhibition match, being hosted to build on the popularity of women’s cricket in India after the run to the final of the ICC Women’s World Cup 2017, will be played from 14:00 IST.

Squads

IPL Trailblazers: Alyssa Healy (wk), Smriti Mandhana (c), Suzie Bates, Deepti Sharma, Beth Mooney, Jemimah Rodrigues, Danielle Hazell, Shikha Pandey, Lea Tahuhu, Jhulan Goswami, Ekta Bisht, Poonam Yadav, D Hemalatha

IPL Supernovas: Danielle Wyatt, Mithali Raj, Meg Lanning, Harmanpreet Kaur (c), Sophie Devine, Ellyse Perry, Veda Krishnamurthy, Mona Meshram, Pooja Vastrakar, Megan Schutt, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Anuja Patil, Taniya Bhatia (wk)