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Major League Cricket (MLC) franchise, Washington Freedom on Wednesday, May 21 announced the signing of Australian veteran Steven Smith. The Aussie batter, who led the Freedom to a title win last year, will feature only in two of its games in the 2025 edition. The decision of Smith’s short stint in MLC comes seeing Australia’s tight international calendar.
With the T20 cricket league clashing with several international assignments, Smith will only be available for two games. After finishing his duties with the national side in the highly-anticipated World Test Championship (WTC) Final from June 11 to 15 at the Lord’s, Smith will travel to Dallas for a couple of matches, scheduled on June 21 and 22.
Mark Chapman to replace Steve Smith following his short stint with Washington Freedom
He is then set to leave for the Caribbean islands as Australia is set to tour West Indies for Test series, scheduled to begin from June 25. Following his stint with Freedom, New Zealand batter Mark Chapman is set to replace Smith in the squad.
Apart from Mark Chapman, Washington Freedom have also named a few more replacements with Travis Head and Marco Jansen unavialble for the entire tournament. Mitchell Owen, Kiwi pacer Ben Sears and Jason Behrendorff will join the Freedom as overseas backups.
Washington Freedom squad for MLC 2025
Steve Smith (2 matches), Saurabh Netravalkar, Andries Gous, Glenn Maxwell, 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
