BCCI Announces Kochi Auction Date for WPL Season 5

The next chapter of the Women’s Premier League now has a start line.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has informed the five WPL franchises that the Season 5 auction will be held on October 28 in Kochi, with the formal communication going out on Wednesday (September 16). The calendar is set. The scramble begins now.

Retention clock is ticking

Franchises have been given a hard deadline: September 28. By then, each team must finalise which players they will retain and who will be released back into the auction pool.

The framework remains tight and competitive. Squads can carry a maximum of 18 players, with no more than six overseas players in any roster. The salary cap for this cycle is INR 15 crore, a figure that will force some uncomfortable calls on big contracts and fringe talent alike.

Those ten days between now and the retention deadline will decide the shape of the auction. They will also decide which established names are suddenly back on the market and which young domestic players keep their spots in evolving squads.

Mumbai–Vadodara set to host again

While the auction heads to Kochi, the cricket itself is expected to stay familiar.

The BCCI is understood to have narrowed down Mumbai and Vadodara as the venues for Season 5, with the tournament likely to be staged in the January–February window, mirroring last season’s slot. The Cricket Club of India (CCI) in Mumbai and the Kotambi Stadium in Vadodara have been identified as the definitive grounds.

Both venues know this drill. Season 4 ran through these two cities, with the final played in the Gujarat city on February 5. The template worked, and the board appears ready to lean on that stability again.

Royal Challengers Bengaluru, who lifted the trophy last season, will return as defending champions on surfaces they already understand, in conditions that suited them well enough to go all the way.

Varanasi idea on hold

There had been a romantic suggestion in the background: take the WPL to Varanasi, where a new stadium is under construction, and open up another pocket of the country to top-level women’s cricket.

For now, that idea sits firmly in the “not yet” column.

Sources connected to the WPL indicate that any move to stage matches in Varanasi depends entirely on the readiness of the new venue. The ground will first need to host domestic fixtures and pass those quiet, crucial tests that every new stadium faces before it can handle a televised league.

At this stage, using Varanasi for WPL games is seen as a remote possibility rather than an imminent expansion. The ambition is there; the infrastructure is not quite ready to match it.

Season 5 on the horizon

So the picture is clear. Kochi for the auction. Mumbai and Vadodara for the cricket. A INR 15 crore cap to stretch, bend and exploit. Eighteen-player squads to construct with no room for sentiment.

The WPL’s fifth season is still months away on the calendar, but the real contest—between analysts, scouts and decision-makers—starts now.