Washington Freedom will have to announce a new captain for the 2025 edition of the Major League Cricket (MLC), with Steve Smith available just for two games. Smith wants to feature in the tournament, having led the Freedom to the title last year, however, the international calendar isn't letting one of the Test greats be available for more than two matches with the World Test Championship (WTC) final and Australia's tour of the West Indies clashing with the tournament.
Smith will get done with the WTC final on June 15 in London and then will have to travel to Dallas for a couple of games on June 21 and 22, before he leaves for the Caribbean with the Test series against the West Indies scheduled to begin on June 25. Hence, the Freedom, coached by Ricky Ponting, have also confirmed a replacement in Mark Chapman, who will add depth to the middle order.
Apart from Chapman, Freedom have added a few more reinforcements to the squad with Travis Head and Marco Jansen also unavailable for the whole tournament due to the international calendar. Mitch Owen, who has become the apple of everyone's eye on the franchise circuit, getting gigs in the IPL, the PSL and SA20 after his heroics in the Big Bash League, Kiwi pacer Ben Sears, all-rounder Glenn Phillips and Jason Behrendorff will join the Freedom as overseas backups. Similarly, Pat Cummins too won't be available for the San Francisco Unicorns.
Glenn Maxwell, Lockie Ferguson and Rachin Ravindra will stay with the franchise. As far as the local roster is concerned, pacer Jessy Singh was traded to Seattle Orcas before the Freedom got left-arm bowler in Abhishek Paradkar. Freedom will kick their campaign off on June 14 against the Orcas in California.
Washington Freedom squad for MLC 2025: Steve Smith (2 matches), Saurabh Netravalkar, Andries Gous, Glenn Maxwell, Glenn Phillips, Mitch Owen, Justin Dill, Rachin Ravindra, Ian Holland, Lahiru Milantha, Abhishek Paradkar, Mark Chapman (Smith's replacement), Jack Edwards, Jason Behrendorff, Ben Sears, Lockie Ferguson, Obus Pienaar, Yasir Mohammad, Amila Aponso