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The cricket sport has no face of any specific religion, nation, or gender, the game is open to everyone. In ancient times, women have been marginalized from outside working jobs, and sports activities were considered an incompetent field for women. It took a long year for women worldwide to break all the stereotypes and recreate history with a new vision. Once women got the confidence for sports, they never looked back; they entered all the national & international level competitions of different sports including cricket.
Moving forward to the present, we are heading towards welcoming the introduction of the ICC Womens Cricket World Cup. The latest cricketing news is packed with major updates which positively make it to a global reach among a large audience. Another impactful step is the Women's Indian Premier League, the best example to showcase the growing interest of women in cricket.
The appeal of women's cricket started around 1934 when Australia and New Zealand Association was formed. It was a step forward to take women's cricket internationally. During 1934-35 England team players played three test matches of the Australian cricket season and won two of them. Finally, in 1958 International Womens Cricket Council was formed to encourage women to participate in sports and secure their dream.
The council also manages the debate & discussion over any match and challenge with rules. In the starting year, the founding members were only England, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, and Holland. The membership gradually expanded over other countries' women associations like India and West Indies in 1973, Ireland in 1982, Denmark in 1983, Pakistan in 1997, and Sri Lanka in 1997.
With the support of England captain Rachael Heyhoe Flint and businessman Jack Hayward, the first womens world cup was held. In 1973, Hayward invested over £40,000 in seven playing teams: England, New Zealand, English youth team, Australia, Jamaica, Tobago, Trinidad, and International XI. The tournament was successful and for the 1973 finals, MCC agreed to the finals at the €˜The Home of Cricket for the first time.
In 2005, the International Cricket Council (ICC) handed over the control & management of the global womens game from the International Womens Cricket Council (ICC). All the international women's associations merged with the men's associations to scale up the management and improve the game.
After the merger of the women's association with the men's cricket association, it solved the funding problems of female cricket tournaments. Women have been facing backlash from playing for many reasons, such as questioning their strength for such a high stamina game, marriage, their responsibilities to families, and other baseless reasons. However, women across the world are replacing these stereotypical thoughts with competing men on the cricket ground.
Another barrier associated with female cricket is the absence of funding to train women and prepare them for international competition. In the Initial period, organizations also showed disinterest in scaling womens cricket as they found it less profitable. However, year by year, the women 's team shows their inner capability to level up the game of mens cricket and attract a lot of fans, media attention, and international association support.
This is one of the oldest & most prestigious tournaments for female cricket. Under the championship series, women players compete in One Day International & Twenty 20 (T20) matches. Australian women's national cricket team made a different name in the achievement list, Indian womens cricket team has made it to finals twice but didnt taste victory yet.
BCCI took inspiration from
ICC to promote womens cricket by starting the Indian Premier League IPL in the womens edition. At the commencement of Women IPL, 2018, top international women cricketers participate to increase the reach on a wider scale. The international audience shows positive support for the great initiative and encourages more cricketers to mark their talent in international tournaments.
Ellyse Perry is one of the most famous young players from the Australian team. At the age of 16, she appeared in international tournaments of cricket. She won the Belinda Clark Awards three times & also got the Rachael Heyhoe Flint Award. Sarah Jane Taylor representing the England team made it to the top two positions & became the best women's cricketer in the world. Jhulan Goswami ranks top 3 positions for the best female cricketer and fastest bowler in India. Jhulan got the ICC Womens Player of the Year award, in 2017.
Katherine Helen Brunt from England, Lisa Carprini Sthalekar from - the Australian Team, Stafanie Roxann Taylor- from the West Indies, Mithali Raj from - the Indian Team, Meghann Lanning from- the Australian Women's cricket team, Shashikala Siriwardene - Former captain of Sri Lanka, and Sana Mir of Pakistan. All these prestigious players prove that cricket doesn't differentiate in gender and raise the bar of women's sport.
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