Dani Gibson earned a £190,000 payday to become the highest-paid English woman at the inaugural Hundred auction, while uncapped teenager Tilly Corteen-Coleman picked up a bumper £105,000 deal.
The level of spending at the United Kingdom’s first player auction in a major professional sport represents a huge uplift in the women’s game, where the top salary band in the previous system started at £15,000 in 2021 and was still capped at £65,000 last summer.
The tournament has received a major cash injection after selling off stakes in all eight franchises to private investors and the new owners of the rebranded Headingley franchise, Sunrisers Leeds, went big to secure Gibson’s services on the bidding floor at London’s Piccadilly Lights.
Injury problems mean the hard-hitting all-rounder has not played for her country since October 2024, but she still ended up closing a contract worth £50,000 more than England skipper Nat Sciver-Brunt and pace bowler Lauren Bell, who had already agreed deals as pre-auction ‘direct signings’.
Gibson is one of 30 players who has just arrived in South Africa for an England training camp and intra-squad series and now carries the heftiest price tag of anyone there, despite her relatively junior status in the national set-up.
Only two overseas players attracted bigger offers, Australia’s Beth Mooney reeling in £210,000 from Trent Rockets and New Zealand’s Sophie Devine fetching the same from Welsh Fire.
Eighteen-year-old left-arm spinner Corteen-Coleman was also in Pretoria celebrating a remarkable result, fetching six figures from her previous franchise, Southern Brave.
Corteen-Coleman became the Hundred’s youngest player when she first appeared as a 16-year-old in 2024 and is a highly-rated prospect, who specialises in the powerplay overs.
She has an outside chance of featuring in this summer’s T20 World Cup on home soil but finds herself behind the world’s number one left-armer Sophie Ecclestone and Linsey Smith in the pecking order. Smith was another big winner, taking home £100,000 from Birmingham Phoenix.
Southern Brave shelled out £105,000 for pace bowler Issy Wong, while rising star Davina Perrin, who became the first woman to hit a century in the Hundred last year, was a relative bargain at £50,000 for Birmingham Phoenix as she was first to go under auctioneer Richard Madley’s hammer.
Lauren Winfield-Hill, who captained Oval Invincibles in 2025, was among those unsold in the first round.
Women’s squads have a total of £880,000 available to fill their rosters, with men’s sides allowed a budget of £2.05m, with their auction taking place on Thursday.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Former England spinner Alex Hartley reacts to the big-money moves in the Hundred auction, including Tilly Corteen-Coleman to the Southern Brave.
When is the 2026 edition of The Hundred?
The tournament runs from Tuesday July 21 to Sunday August 16, with Sunrisers Leeds Women and MI London Men starting their title defences on day one, at The Kia Oval.
Every match from the men’s and women’s competitions will be live on Sky Sports, including the eliminators on Friday August 14 and finals two days later, with every day seeing a women’s game precede a men’s fixture at the same venue.
How does the tournament work?
Teams play eight group games, meeting six sides once and their local rivals twice.
MI London face London Spirit on two occasions, with the other home and away fixtures Sunrisers vs Giants, Rockets vs Phoenix, and Brave vs Fire.
The men’s and women’s sides that top the league phase will qualify directly for the finals, with the sides ending second and third meeting in the eliminator to decide the table-toppers’ opponents.
