WBBL 2025: Brisbane Heat retained Jemimah Rodrigues from Melbourne Stars, no other Indian player got a chance

Indian batsman Jemimah Rodrigues has become the only Indian player to be selected in the draft of the Women's Big Bash League (WBBL) 2025. She has been retained by her former team, Brisbane Heat, and made a part of their team again. In the draft held on Thursday, Jemimah was selected as the first choice by Melbourne Stars, but the Heat decided to retain her using the retention right.

Playing for the Heat in the previous year, Jemimah had a total of 267 runs from 10 innings at an average of 33 and a strike rate of 139 with one half-century to her name. The Heat reached the final last year and remained runners-up as they lost the rain-affected final against the Melbourne Renegades. `This would be Rodrigues's fourth WBBL season. Previously, she has represented the Renegades in the 2021-22 season and the Stars in the 2022-23 season. On the whole, she has made a total of 644 runs from 28 innings of the 30 matches played by her in this league at an average of 26 and a strike rate of 121 with three half-centuries to her name.

Apart from Rodrigues, a total of 15 Indians were involved in the draft process of WBBL and BBL. Apart from fast bowler Siddharth Kaul, who has retired from Indian cricket, it included names like Yastika Bhatia, Shikha Pandey, Kanika Ahuja, Uma Chhetri, Saloni Dangore, Amarpal Kaur Dhillon, Kashvi Gautam, Priya Mishra, Shreyanka Patil, Nikki Prasad, Pratika Rawal, Arundhati Reddy, S Meghna, and Radha Yadav. However, the luck of none of them opened. Shikha Pandey was also in the Heat team with Rodrigues last year.

Expressing happiness over this signing, Rodrigues wrote on her Instagram, "I am back with my family and can't wait to join the team."

At the same time, West Indies all-rounder Hayley Matthews has been ruled out of WBBL 2025 due to a shoulder injury. She suffered this injury during the first ODI of the limited-overs series against England, and due to this, she could not play the remaining two ODIs of the series. However, after this, she has returned to the national team, and she will also play in the CPL. But after that, she will have shoulder surgery, and she will be out for the rest of the year. This is a big blow for the Renegades as the Renegades had selected her for the next two years as a pre-season signing, even before the draft.