The West Indies Cricket Board has become the latest to offer significantly improved central contracts to its women’s team, which like the New Zealand contracts announced earlier this year, will lift many of the squad into the realms of full professionalism for the first time.
The number of contracted players increases from 11 to 15; and although the WICB have not released details of the salaries to be paid, CRICKETher understands that the average remuneration including match fees etc. is likely to be in the realms of $30-40,000 (USD). Adjusted for cost-of-living, this represents something like £35,000 – not a king’s ransom, but a good living wage nonetheless.
Interestingly, the president of the Players Association which negotiated these contracts with the board, Wavell Hinds, cited not the recent WWT20 win, but consistency over a number of years, saying:
“Our women senior team has been a solid elite performing group over the last decade. As such, the improvement and security in their compensation package is well deserved.”
This is an important point – as Raf Nicholson argued in her CricInfo Cordon column last year, tying the contracts to particular successes merely creates a hostage to fortune when those successes inevitably pass into history.
CRICKETher 
Think this may come back to bite the WICB. WI have not yet qualified for the World Cup & it is not a foregone conclusion that they will do so, with series against England & India to play. Lose 3-0 to England & it will be all up for grabs in India in Nov/Dec. Very small pool of players in WI & this could keep it that way.
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OK WCB, so the timing may be a bit of a risk. But personally as a fan of women’s cricket I think this has to be a good thing, and has to happen at some point. Their national players deserve to be paid a living wage. If it was an increase from “loadsa money” to “even more” I might raise a question surrounding spreading your funds around your assets, but when it’s from peanuts to cashews, no big deal.
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