This morning’s announcement that the BCCI has just sold two new IPL franchises for more than $2 billion exposes the staggering hypocrisy of those running the game in that country.
Already we have a 60-game IPL season that stretches (in a normal year) over seven weeks, this will now expand to 74 matches, providing more playing opportunities for India’s emerging talents to compete with the very best in the world.
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Unless those emerging talents and current superstars happen to be female, in which case they’ve been left high and dry. Again.
While Cricket Australia enjoys unprecedented TV ratings for this year’s WBBL tournament, widely regarded as the best domestic female cricket competition in the world, the BCCI continues to leave its head in the sand.
Since 2018 the Women’s T20 Challenge has existed, firstly as a standalone match, expanding to four games between three teams in 2019 and 2020.
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In 2021, however, the concept has stalled. Initially postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is yet to be rescheduled. Given it’s now late October, it’s hardly a stretch to conclude that it will be quietly abandoned altogether.
That’s despite the fact that the IPL was also postponed in early May in the face of skyrocketing case numbers in India. But, unlike the women’s version of the tournament, the BCCI moved heaven and earth to complete the IPL in the middle east, with the tournament wrapping up on the eve of the T20 World Cup.
There were even suggestions that India’s decision to pull out of the fifth Test against England at Old Trafford in September was made because players had one eye on the IPL, a situation that seems unfathomable to Australians.
India’s recent tour of Australia saw the home side win both completed T20 matches (one was washed out), although the margin of victory – four wickets in Game Two and 14 runs in Game Three – shows that India are not far away from matching Australia.
The victory in Game Three was only possible thanks to an unbeaten 44 from Tahlia McGrath, playing in just her eighth T20 International, but a veteran of six seasons in the WBBL.
“If you look at the way Tahlia McGrath batted, we can see the confidence they are getting from a tournament like WBBL… she has not played much in international cricket but got to play many matches before playing for Australia,” Indian captain Harmanpreet Kaur said after that match.
“Ever since (the men’s team) got a platform like the IPL, young male talents competing at the international level show maturity in their performance because they carry with them the tag of 40-50 IPL games, where they may have played very good cricket, even winning their side’s matches.
“I think that is the only reason we are lacking right now.
“If we get the opportunity to play domestic cricket at a good level before playing such international games, we will definitely improve as a team.”
Cricket Australia could have taken the easy route and cancelled this year’s WBBL tournament in the face of travel restrictions between states and even a lockdown in Tasmania. Instead, they’ve forked out millions of dollars in extra costs to ensure it goes ahead.
Players from Victoria and New South Wales had to do a hard hotel quarantine in Tasmania, while a biosecurity bubble had to be implemented overnight when Hobart and surrounding areas went into lockdown.
The balance sheet is no doubt a sea of red ink, but the endgame for CA was evident in March 2020, when 86,174 fans turned up to the MCG for the Women’s T20 World Cup final.
Australian superstar Alyssa Healy has previously said she’d love to be involved in a WIPL, and there’s no doubt those views would be shared by the best female players in other nations. At a time when the women’s game is enjoying unprecedented growth, a full scale WIPL is a no-brainer.
Doubtless, Cricket Australia’s finances would be in better shape without the WBBL at the moment. But the short-term pain is worth it for the long-term gain of giving women and girls the same opportunity afforded their male counterparts.
If only those running the BCCI thought likewise.
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