Aussie skipper goes unsold in India’s WPL auction shockIan ChadbandAAPFri, 28 November 2025 3:57AM
Australian great Alyssa Healy has proved the sensation of the Women’s Premier League ‘mega auction’ in New Delhi — by not attracting a single bidder.
Yet while the six-time World Cup winner and one of the marquee names in the game went unsold, two of her fellow Aussie stars, Meg Lanning and Phoebe Litchfield, were snapped up in big-money deals by the UP Warriorz franchise who have let their captain Healy go.
Lanning, in searing form in the WBBL, was snapped up for $A326,000 by the Lucknow-based franchise while Litchfield sold for $A206,000 — and the pair could make a spectacular opening partnership when the fourth edition of the tournament gets under way in the New Year.
But the big shock of the auction came at the very start when Healy, one of the marquee lots after her recent back-to-back hundreds at the World Cup showcased her continued brilliance at 35, attracted no interest.
Her injury woes, which have plagued her over the past couple of years, must have counted against her, and her poor start to the season in the WBBL won’t have helped either as she’s amassed only 65 runs in four innings, yet it was still a shock that the superstar wicketkeeper-batter-captain was overlooked.
Almost as surprising was that the matchwinning talent of legspinning maestro Alana King, another Australian star at the recent World Cup, also went unwanted.
Australians, though, will feature as strongly as ever in the league, with 13 players in all featuring among all five teams, including the champions Mumbai Indians, who have snapped up Hobart Hurricanes’ allrounder Nicola Carey and Melbourne Renegades’ bowler Milly Illingworth.
Allrounder Deepti Sharma, whose player-of-the-tournament performance helped India dethrone Healy’s Australians and win the World Cup earlier in the month, fetched the highest price of the day, claimed back by her original team UP Warriorz for A$549,000 using their Right-to-Match card.
In all, the five franchises spent a total of $A6.9 million to sign 67 players ahead of the world’s leading women’s Twenty20 League.
The tournament will begin on January 9 and run to February 5, staged in Navi Mumbai and Vadodara, with the final to take place two days before India co-hosts the men’s T20 World Cup with Sri Lanka.
AUSTRALIANS AND THEIR WPL TEAMS FOR 2026:
Delhi Capitals: Annabel Sutherland, Lucy Hamilton.
Gujarat Giants: Ash Gardner, Beth Mooney, Georgia Wareham, Kim Garth.
Mumbai Indians: Nicola Carey, Milly Illingworth.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru: Ellyse Perry, Grace Harris, Georgia Voll.
UP Warriorz: Meg Lanning, Phoebe Litchfield.
Unsold players: Alyssa Healy, Amanda-Jade Wellington, Alana King, Darcie Brown, Laura Harris, Heather Graham.
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