Or­gan­is­ers have an­nounced an ex­pan­sion of this year’s Women’s Caribbean Pre­mier League (CPL), with sev­en match­es now be­ing staged in the Au­gust 30 to Sep­tem­ber 10 cam­paign.

The three teams – Trin­ba­go Knight Rid­ers, Bar­ba­dos Roy­als and Guyana Ama­zon War­riors – will fea­ture in four group games with the top two clinch­ing their places in the fi­nal in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Last year, on­ly four match­es were played in the in­au­gur­al com­pe­ti­tion with each side play­ing one group game.

“We are huge­ly ex­cit­ed to have an ex­pand­ed WC­PL sched­ule for 2023 and we are grate­ful to the gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go for their sup­port in help­ing to grow the tour­na­ment in 2023,” said CPL chief ex­ec­u­tive, Pe­te Rus­sell.

“We are very much look­ing for­ward to see­ing one of these three fan­tas­tic teams lift the WC­PL tro­phy in Trinidad and To­ba­go on Sep­tem­ber 10.”

Trin­ba­go Knight Rid­ers, cap­tained by re­tired West In­dies all-rounder De­an­dra Dot­tin, won last year’s ti­tle by beat­ing the Hay­ley Matthews-led Bar­ba­dos Roy­als in the fi­nal at Warn­er Park in Bas­seterre.

The likes of South Africans Sune Lu­us and Chloe Try­on, along with Sri Lankan Chamari Atha­p­aththu and Pak­istan’s Fa­ti­ma Sana fea­tured in the tour­na­ment, and or­gan­is­ers said Mon­day the show­piece would again in­volve the “best tal­ent from across the Caribbean and some of the best in­ter­na­tion­al crick­eters from around the world.”

Trinidad and To­ba­go’s Sports Min­is­ter, Sham­fa Cud­joe, said stag­ing the fi­nal was in keep­ing with her min­istry’s goals of “pro­mot­ing women and girls in sport”.

“Once again, the Gov­ern­ment of the Re­pub­lic of Trinidad and To­ba­go is pleased to part­ner with the Caribbean Pre­mier League as we get ready to host the fi­nal match of the 2023 Women’s CPL,” said Cud­joe.

“The host­ing of this game comes at an op­por­tune time as it strate­gi­cal­ly aligns with the goal of the Min­istry’s on­go­ing Pink Reign TT cam­paign, which speaks to pro­mot­ing women and girls in sport.

“This not on­ly al­lows Trinidad and To­ba­go to show­case the true spir­it of the Caribbean by bring­ing to­geth­er crick­et en­thu­si­asts from around the world, but it al­so serves as a tes­ta­ment to the Gov­ern­ment’s com­mit­ment to en­cour­age women and girls to live a health­i­er, more ac­tive lifestyle.

“This year, we look for­ward to work­ing hand in hand with CPL and oth­er key stake­hold­ers to en­sure a seam­less and un­for­get­table ex­pe­ri­ence for all par­tic­i­pants and at­ten­dees.”

CMC