Author: Syd Egan

OPINION: Talk Is Cheap As Women Fly Economy To World Cup

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In an irony which we have reason to believe was not lost on our friends at the ECB, England’s top male and female cricketers found themselves promoting a campaign for gender equality less than 24 hours after flying to the T20 World Cup in somewhat less than equal circumstances.

The ‘Pledge For Parity’ hashtag which dominated Twitter on International Women’s Day was heavily promoted by the ECB; but while Joe Root and Eoin Morgan took a luxurious business class flight to India, Sarah Taylor and the women’s team were on a different plane… cramped up in economy.

It is important to note that the flights were paid for by the ICC not the ECB; and to recognise that this has happened against a background of the ICC having considerably increased their level of investment in this event, in terms of prize money and broadcast coverage.

Nevertheless, the ECB could have paid for an upgrade to the flights. Indeed, this is exactly what Cricket Australia did; with the Southern Stars flying ‘Business’* after pressure from the Australian government, which threatened to withdraw state funding from the game if more equitable travel arrangements were not provided for the men’s and women’s teams.

So should the ECB have followed Cricket Australia’s lead and provided the upgrades? CRICKETher accepts that these can be difficult decisions, and there is an argument that there are much better ways to spend the £30,000† it would have cost to even bump the players up to ‘Premium Economy’ let alone ‘Business’.

But at the very least, perhaps the ECB could use some of its much-vaunted influence at the ICC to see if something can’t be done about this next time, so that future ‘Pledges for Parity’ ring a little less hollow.

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* This piece originally stated that the Southern Stars flew ‘Premium Economy’ – this was corrected on 21/03/2016.
† Based on the list price, flying BA.

NEWS: WWT20 TV Coverage – Still More Matches… But Bad News For England Fans

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The announcement by the ICC of further expanded TV coverage of the Women’s World T20 in India is good news… except if you are an England fan.

The ICC has confirmed that 13 matches, including the semi-finals and final, will now be broadcast, and all 10 teams will have at least one televised game. (Previously just 10 broadcast matches had been promised.)

However, there is disappointment for England fans.

Sky had previously said that all of England’s group matches would be shown:

But it now seems that only the group games against Bangladesh (on Thursday 17th March) and India (on Tuesday 22 March) will be televised. (Sky’s updated schedule confirms this here.)

The full revised TV schedule is below, but check with your broadcaster to see which ones they are actually transmitting!

(Sky don’t appear to be showing all of them: Ireland’s only broadcast game – against Australia – is one missing from Sky’s schedule, for example.)

  • Tuesday 15 March – India v Bangladesh
  • Thursday 17 March – England v Bangladesh
  • Saturday 19 March – India v Pakistan
  • Monday 21 March – Australia v New Zealand
  • Tuesday 22 March – England v India
  • Thursday 24 March – Australia v Sri Lanka
  • Thursday 24 March – Pakistan v Bangladesh
  • Saturday 26 March – Australia v Ireland
  • Sunday 27 March – West Indies v India
  • Monday 28 March – South Africa v Sri Lanka
  • Wednesday 30 March – Semi-Final 1
  • Thursday 31 March – Semi-Final 2
  • Sunday 3 April – Final

NEWS: Berkshire Look To Future With New Coaching Team

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Berkshire have appointed a new coaching team for 2016, led by ex England Test batsman Aftab Habib, assisted by two former Berkshire players: Emma Boswell and Hannah Burr. CRICKETher met up with them this week to find out more…

New Head Coach Aftab Habib played two Tests for England in 1999; and after a successful county cricket career which included a Championship title with Leicestershire and two 1,000-run seasons, he made the move into coaching. He has previously run Women’s & Girls’ development in Buckinghamshire, and more recently coached the Hong Kong national side.

Assistant Coach Emma Boswell meanwhile is recently retired from the Royal Navy, having spent much of the past few years beneath the waves in a nuclear submarine; but still finding time to skipper the Navy’s women’s cricket team. She and fellow Assistant Coach Hannah Burr played together at Berkshire in the late 90s and early 00s, and will now team up again, working with both the 1st XI and the age-group squads.

Aftab Habib, Hannah Burr and Emma Boswell

Aftab Habib, Hannah Burr and Emma Boswell Meet to Plot Berkshire’s Season

Berkshire’s senior squad is likely to have a familiar look to it this season. Though sadly Aussie overseas Crinny Hall won’t be returning, the core of the team which came 4th in last years Women’s County Championship are expected to be reunited for the 2016 campaign.

Beyond the immediate present, Berkshire are looking to build a more sustainable foundation for the women’s game in the county, hoping to emulate some of the success which Sussex have had in this regard under the leadership of Charlotte Burton.

One target is to broaden the base of the women’s game, to the point where there is a genuinely competitive “selection” process for the squads at both senior and age-ground level. This will partly be achieved by strengthening links between the county and the clubs in the area which run girls’ sections.

Another objective is to create the next generation of female coaches for the women’s game, by encouraging all the players in the age-group squads to begin the process of earning their badges by working with the age-groups below them, with the hopes that the next cohort of players graduating from the U19s will have already have achieved their Level 1 and be well on their way to Level 2.

Of course, Berkshire don’t have the luxuries available to some of their rivals with First Class men’s county facilities behind them; but you only have to look at the fate of relegated Nottinghamshire and Lancashire last season to see that sometimes that’s not everything – something that Berkshire’s new team are determined to prove once again in 2016.

Worcestershire Women’s Contracts – A Move Towards A More Professional County Game

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For all the flash and fanfare that the ECB’s new Women’s Cricket Super League will bring, it is the Women’s County Championship which is, and will remain, the bedrock of women’s cricket in England. And it is very-much an amateur affair, in every sense of the word – the players aren’t paid, so they train when they want and they play when they want; and it isn’t unusual to enquire after an absent name on the teamsheet as to whether she is injured, only to be told she is on holiday.

Jason Yip and his team at Worcestershire are looking to change all that.

Worcestershire came third in Div 2 last year, going 4-3 in the 50-over competition; but there was a feeling they could have done better.

“We lost a game to Essex because we weren’t professional about the way that we were going about things. We had a few core problems; but the main one was availability – we went down there with just 11 players, including a fourteen year old and an injured player, because many of our team were unavailable or off on holidays.”

“So we asked the question: Girls, the losses to Essex and Durham cost you promotion to Div 1, so what do you want to do about this?”

What emerged from this discussion was that the players didn’t “feel” professional – taking themselves off on holiday was what they had always done, and they felt justified in this because they weren’t professionals. Might the answer be professional contracts?

Yip is quick to point out that contracts aren’t magic:

“Does a contract make you a professional? No! You are professional because you go through your practice, your performance, your review, and your evolution in a methodical and accountable way.”

But it was nevertheless clear that contracts could be an important symbolic step in making the players “feel” professional, and this was the genesis of what is now being announced by the Worcestershire Cricket Board: professional contracts for the county women’s team – a major first in the English domestic game.

It is important to understand that the contracts themselves aren’t about money. But nevertheless it was recognised that money was a potential issue, and so alongside the contracts, Yip is introducing new community participation programs within the county which offer a part-time employment opportunity for the players, who will be working in a variety of roles – from office and admin to coaching – tailoring their hours to suit their personal situations, such as fitting-in around their university studies, for example.

The pay isn’t stratospheric, but it is “a lot more than they [the players] would earn stacking shelves in Sainsbury’s”; and furthermore the programs themselves are self-financing, rather than being based on ECB grants or charitable donations.

Yip says:

“It is about showing you [the player] that we’ll meet you half-way on a whole number of fronts. In order to progress we need both the individual and the team to move their performance in a positive direction; and we’ll help you through this as much as we can; but with this comes ownership and accountability.”

It is certainly a fantastic time to be involved in the Women’s and Girls’ programs at Worcester, with further fixtures (hopefully plural!) planned for the Rapids’ women’s team at New Road, after history was made there last season; and a drive towards a more valuable level of participation, with girls schemes running across several weeks rather than just one-off sessions. It’s an exciting journey, and we’re already looking forward to catching up with Jason and his team later in the season to see how it is all going!

OPINION: Bradford’s Telegraph & Argus Write WCSL Piece… Manage To Make It All About A Man!

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Bradford’s Telegraph and Argus has written an article on the Women’s Cricket Super League; and it’s one of those pieces that you sometimes just have to call out:

Yes – it might be a Women’s Cricket Super League (the clue is in the word “women’s” chaps!!) but the Telegraph and Argus have managed to make it all about a man – the headline, the (only) photograph and the byline – all focusing on coach Richard Pyrah.

And quite right too: if you start giving women headlines and photographs, they’ll want the vote next… and then where will we be?

(To be fair, the piece does name 3 women… buried in the final paragraph… so really, we don’t know what we are snarking about!!)

WCSL Q&A – Players & TV

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Now that the ECB have announced the WCSL team names, people are starting to get excited, and they’ve got a few questions too. Here’s what we know in answer to some of the things we’ve been asked.

Who will be playing for “my” team?

Officially… we don’t know yet! The ECB have already allocated the 35 Performance (i.e. contracted) and Academy players to the teams – they know who they will be playing for, and so do the team managers and coaches – but the rest of us are waiting for an official announcement over the next couple of weeks.

Will the England players stay with their local county teams?

In most cases, yes… but rumour has it, maybe not all!

What about the “overseas” stars?

Around 60 overseas stars applied for the 18 roster-spots on-offer in WCSL. The hosts (franchises) are now negotiating with the ECB over who will go where. Whilst the England players were allocated by the ECB, this part of the process is host-driven – they say who they want, presumably after weighing up which England players they have (there’s perhaps little point in having Sarah Taylor and Alyssa Healy, for example) and this is then subject to ECB approval.

Where are the other players coming from?

The hosts will be selecting the remaining 5-6 domestic players themselves – probably drawing them mainly from their local county teams, subject to formal ECB approval.

Will it be on TV?

This was always going to be a tricky one. Sky own the rights to all cricket played under the auspices of the ICC in England and Wales; and they jealously guard their exclusivity, so realistically it was Sky or bust – there was never any chance that one of the “free-to-air” broadcasters would be able to show it. And although we understand Sky were reasonably happy with the viewing figures for last summer’s Women’s Ashes, this is seen as a much less commercially enticing proposition, so it seems unlikely that the league stages will be broadcast.

But… wasn’t the WBBL a big TV success?

Yes… but… that was based on “built-in” support for the existing (men’s) franchises and it was paid for by Cricket Australia, who fronted-up the bulk of the broadcasting costs. The WCSL just doesn’t have the budget to do this.

Might the finals be televised?

The finals will be played on a “showcase” day at Chelmsford, and it is rumoured that the ECB are still hoping that Sky might be enticed to get their cameras out for this, but it isn’t a given yet.

The men’s counties stream some games online – could they do this for WCSL?

The streaming of men’s county games is explicitly built into the contract between the ECB and Sky, and is only permitted when there isn’t any other cricket being broadcast at that time. Streaming WCSL would require additional special dispensation from Sky; however, there is a precedent – Sky allowed the ECB to live-stream the England/ India ODI series in 2014 – so it isn’t out of the question.

All answers provided in good faith, to the best of our knowledge.

If we’ve got anything wrong, we will more than happily correct it – you know where we live 😉

BREAKING: Super League Team Names

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Here they are…

  • Lancashire Thunder
  • Loughborough Lightning
  • Southern Vipers [Hampshire etc.]
  • Surrey Stars
  • Western Storm [Somerset, Gloucestershire, etc.]
  • Yorkshire Diamonds

A couple of interesting notes:

  • Lancashire have been allowed to keep their semi-official “County Championship” name, although it isn’t supposed to be the same team, and there is no guarantee in theory that they will have the same players.
  • Surrey will brand themselves as “Surrey” rather than “London”; which will no doubt draw-in supporters of Surrey’s men’s team… but may also exclude cricket fans north of the river!
  • Loughborough have been permitted to extend their existing “Lightning” brand, which is already used by their Superleague [sic. – one word!] netball team.

OPINION: Reasons To Be Cheerful… 1, 2, 3!

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As England fly home from their tour to South Africa, new coach Mark Robinson undoubtedly has some issues to reflect upon; but he also has some reasons to be cheerful:

1. They Took Home The Silverware

England might have lost a couple of matches they would have hoped to have won – particularly the ODI, when the loss also meant dropping points to a rival in the race for automatic World Cup qualification. But even Australia lose the odd match here and there (the Southern Stars have dropped points to both India and New Zealand so far this year) and at the end of the day, England recovered to bring home the silverware in both the ODI and T20 series.

2. They Have Taylor and Shrubsole

As if we needed reminding, England have in Taylor and Shrubsole two world-beaters who could carry them to WWT20 glory in India. Despite a couple of blips in ODIs 2 and 3, Taylor topped the batting numbers with 278 runs at an average of 56 and a Strike Rate of 125; whilst Shrubsole looks to be back in the sort of form that made her Player of the Tournament at the last WWT20 – taking 15 wickets at an average of 16.5*.

3. They Have a Coach Who Is Doing The Right Things

Mark Robinson’s reign might not have gotten off to the perfect start, but he has done a lot of things right on this tour. Despite what you might think, I firmly believe that one of them was not dropping Tammy Beaumont for the final T20, despite her failures in the first two matches; and in the final game she proved something – to him, to me… and possibly even to herself – by carrying England home when things were actually starting to look just a little shaky for a moment! Similarly the faith shown in Amy Jones and Danni Wyatt will also hopefully start to pay dividends, as Mark starts to make his… er… MARK!!

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* Stats include the warm-up matches.

OPINION: England Need Radical Change After Years Of Net Loss

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With South Africa winning the 2nd T20, that series now stands at 1-1; and with van Niekerk in the form she’s in, you’d be a fool to bet against the Women Proteas taking the silverware in the decider on Sunday.

There is little doubt that South Africa continue to improve, and I stand by my predictions that (1) they are a very good bet to reach the 2017 World Cup final, and (2) Dane van Niekerk will be the best player in the world in her generation… Meg Lanning or no Meg Lanning!

South Africa’s success has been generally attributed to the impact of increasing professionalism, with most of the team now on semi-pro contracts. But it is also the case that they seem to have been blessed with some very good young players – not just van Niekerk, but Suné Luus, for example – a leg-spinner whose action is so smooth you have to wonder if she actually has a shoulder… or does her arm just rotate in a large spoonful of treacle?

Meanwhile England have… Tammy Beaumont – over 50 internationals, with a highest score of 44 and an average just-about scraping into double-figures.

Let there be no doubt that we consider “TB” a very, very good county player. If she were a man, she would have had a solid career at a middling First Class county… a Notts or a Somerset… with a benefit year at the end of it, followed by a comfortable retirement, perhaps in a coaching position at a minor public school… doubtless earning a lot more that she does now as a centrally contracted England professional.

But one thing she probably wouldn’t have done is played for England.

So you have to ask what Mark Robinson saw that persuaded him to select her in his squad for the World T20?

Well.. in fact… you don’t have to ask, because we know – he saw her in the nets at Loughborough. And yet it is increasingly clear to everyone who has followed the game for a number of years (and to be fair to Robinson, he’s been very honest that he hasn’t…) that the nets at Loughborough just aren’t walking the walk.

Ask yourself this: which England players have got better over the past two years, since they holed-up at Loughborough as “full time pros”?

(With apologies to Private Eye…)

  1. Heather Knight.
  2. Er…
  3. That’s it!

And even in the case of (1) we suspect this has got a lot to do with the two winters she has spent out in Australia, under the tutelage of the excellent Julia Price at Tasmania Roar / Hobart Hurricanes.

It is hard not to think that England stand in sharp contrast to South Africa’s bright, young future – an aging squad, at least one of whom will almost certainly never play international cricket again; and a very shallow pipeline, which leaves us turning back to players who have already shown that they don’t have quite what it takes at this level.

If Mark Robinson didn’t know it then, we imagine he’s realising it now: there is a vast gulf between English domestic cricket and the international game, and players who are very good at county, and look classy in the nets against a bowling machine they know better than the back of their own hand, can be found-out awfully quickly in the heat of international battle.

When we first met Robinson back in November, he told the assembled press corps that England didn’t need radical change. Perhaps he was just being polite to the old regime? Perhaps not? But when Robinson said that, the editor and I glanced at each other, both thinking the same thing – if we are going to compete for world cups, radical change over the longer term is really now the only option we’ve got!