It was a good night for English women’s cricket last night, with the England team and the ECB both triumphant at the Women’s Sport Trust’s #BeAGameChanger Awards.

England Women took home the Sporting Role Model Team Award, while the ECB won National Governing Body of the Year.

While the England squad were unable to be present, sending a video acceptance, Clare Connor took to the stage to thank all those who had voted.

Speaking about England’s World Cup triumph, she said: “The team did us proud, and it’s up to us now to capitalise on it. We have to make sure it is a game-changing moment.”

“If we can look back in 10 years time and see as many girls playing the game as boys, that will show the game is in really good health.”

The Awards ceremony also saw the launch of the #ShowUp campaign, led by Sky Sports and the Women’s Sport Trust, which encourages people to support women’s sport by turning up to watch.

Former England netballer Tamsin Greenway explained that the campaign had been inspired by the sell-out World Cup final at Lord’s last summer: “I’ve never heard anything like the crowd that day,” she said. “I’ve had bragging rights ever since – ‘I was there!'”

As part of the campaign, Sky are giving away 5,000 tickets to women’s sports events this year to encourage attendance.

On a sunny summer evening at Guildford CC, Middlesex once again stamped their dominance over neighbours Surrey, continuing their unblemished record in the London Cup with a 7-wicket win.

Naomi Dattani was the undoubted star, hitting a fast-powered 52 and taking 2-16.

Opening the innings and with Middlesex chasing Surrey’s 124, Dattani made her intent clear from the outset, blasting five boundaries in the first 2 overs, and punishing England’s Bryony Smith with a six over midwicket.

In no time at all she had reached 50, while partner Tash Miles, watching on from the other end, had only 4 runs to her name. It was an innings of sheer dominance, played with a level of aggression and confidence rarely seen at this level of the game.

Perhaps the only flaw was in its ending; Dattani was eventually dismissed in the 7th over just after passing 50, chipping the ball straight into the hands of the cover fielder, leaving Middlesex on 60-1.

When Dattani departed, the run rate dropped significantly – Middlesex did not reach 100 until the 15th over – but the damage was already done; and captain Tash Miles (28*) eventually saw her side safely over the line with an over to spare.

Earlier, Surrey had won the toss and chosen to bat first; a decision that was rather unfortunate for Middlesex, who with 2 players stuck in traffic on the M25 had to “borrow” Surrey’s 12th man to help field to ensure the game started on time.

Helped by some erratic Middlesex bowling, Surrey got going quickly with 20 runs coming off the first 2 overs.

But the introduction of Dattani to the attack halted the pace as she removed Aylish Cranstone and Hannah Jones in successive overs, leaving Surrey 71-3 at the halfway stage.

For a while it looked as though Bryony Smith would hold things together for Surrey, as she picked off the Middlesex spinners with some stylish cover drives; but young Emma Albery – fresh from taking 4-19 in Sunday’s Championship match against Somerset – eventually slipped through Smith’s defences, bowling her round her legs as she departed 6 short of her half-century.

Led by Eva Gray (15) Surrey attempted to push on with some quick running between the wickets, but Middlesex took advantage of the ensuing pressure to enact two sharp run-outs, ensuring that Surrey finished on a below-par 124-7.

Ahead of this summer’s busy international programme, England are amidst a weekend of warm-up matches against boys teams: yesterday, a T20 against Bedes School 1st XI, and today, a 50-over fixture against the Sussex Academy.

For coach Mark Robinson, who spoke to CRICKETher after yesterday’s match at Bedes, this is vital match practice in the build-up to the international summer.

“We’re desperate to play some Twenty20 games ahead of the World Cup,” he says, “and with the 50-over series coming up against South Africa we’re trying to combine the two.”

The advantage of playing against these boys teams is that: “You get a bit of pace on the ball.” More importantly, he says it is crucial for England to play together against a different and unknown opposition:

“We play against each other and use the England Academy girls, which isn’t quite the same because you know each other.

“So to come and play an opposition where you don’t know who they are, what they’re going to do, how to problem solve, especially in a T20 game where you have to problem solve very very quickly, work out the wicket – that’s the learning that you want.”

He acknowledges that the clash with today’s round of County Championship fixtures is “not ideal” but stresses that a number of the squad have been released to play county today, including the star of yesterday’s match Amy Jones (for Warwickshire).

Robinson speaks positively about Jones’ start to the season – including a score of 68 for Warwickshire in the Women’s County Championship – and says that since the team returned from India she has “hit the ground running and played outstandingly well.”

He selected her to open the batting yesterday in the absence of Danni Wyatt, who is in India for the one-off IPL-style Women’s T20 Challenge. He hopes that for Wyatt, the opportunity to perform on the big stage will allow her to recover from a slow start to the county season: “It’s good for her ego!” he says with a smile. “She likes the big occasions – playing in front of a crowd on a good wicket.”

Jones, meanwhile, repaid the faith shown in her by Robinson handsomely. She was the key contributor to England’s clinical 51-run victory yesterday against the school side, hitting 76 of their 179-run total and keeping wicket in her usual tidy fashion, including a catch and a stumping.

It will be interesting to see whether Robinson finds a place for her in the forthcoming international fixtures – all of which will be challenging.

“On paper New Zealand are the bigger threat, but South Africa have got players who can win games by themselves,” acknowledges Robinson. “It’s a really good summer because anything can happen. None of the games you can take for granted.”

Ahead of the World Twenty20 in November, he is also hoping that the ECB can arrange some further warm-up T20s out in the UAE, against a different international side. “We’re trying to fill the gap,” he says. “Plan C is being in a tent at Loughborough!”

Sussex continued their unbeaten run in Division 2 of the Women’s County Championship today with a maximum bonus point win against Surrey at Reeds School.

3 wickets from Paige Scholfield saw Surrey restricted to 120 all out, before Sarah Taylor hit an unbeaten half-century to take Sussex to a 6-wicket win.

After Surrey had won the toss and chosen to bat, Tara “Chuck” Norris, opening the bowling for Sussex, broke through early to remove Bryony Smith (1) in the second over as her England teammate Danni Wyatt took the catch at point.

Kirstie White (20) and Aylish Cranstone (18) then steadied the ship with a 36-run partnership which was perhaps a bit too steady – Surrey reaching just 27 in the first 10 overs.

That partnership was broken in the 12th over by acting captain Georgia Elwiss; before Paige Scholfield ripped through Surrey’s middle-order in a consecutive 10-over spell, taking 3-17 including the crucial wicket of Nat Sciver (LBW).

England Academy’s Amy Gordon saved Surrey from capitulation with an exciting rearguard cameo (31*) that featured two sixes fired back over the heads of bowlers Norris and Freya Davies. But Sussex had the final say as Davies wrapped things up in the 49th over, removing Beth Kerins LBW.

Sussex were chasing only 120 but Wyatt gave them a scare up top, sending the first ball into the hands of Smith at point – a karmic role reversal from Smith’s own dismissal in the Surrey innings – to leave them 0-1.

That dismissal, though, brought Taylor to the crease, allowing her to continue her form of last weekend in an innings of 60* that exhibited her usual array of classical shots. She now has 3 half-centuries in as many innings, which should please Mark Robinson ahead of the England internationals which begin against South Africa next month.

For Sussex the important thing was to bat positively to ensure they reached the target within 30 overs, thus securing maximum batting bonus points. Taylor’s partnerships with Adams (25) – unscathed after earlier being hit in the forehead while fielding at slip – and Abi Freeborn (21), alongside the rather baffling decision not to bowl Sciver until 8 overs had already elapsed, allowed them to do so without much concern.

Speaking to CRICKETher after close of play, Sussex captain Georgia Adams said that she was really pleased with the way her team had started the season:

“We’ve trained really really hard this winter and we’ve set ourselves really high standards. The big thing for us is, we want to go in with a bang and not just win but win well. We’re definitely looking to win Division 2.”

Hampshire (187-6) beat Nottinghamshire (186-9) by 4 wickets

On a gloriously sunny day at Havant Cricket Club, Hampshire opened their account in Division 1 of the Women’s County Championship with a tense win, chasing down Nottinghamshire’s total of 186 with just 1 over to spare.

Star of last season Suzie Bates had reached her half-century as Hampshire got their chase off to a much-too-leisurely start, reaching 100-3 in 29 overs.

It meant that when Bates departed for 54, having misjudged Kirstie Gordon’s slower ball, Hampshire were already behind the required rate.

Ultimately it took a real team effort to get them across the line, with Emily Windsor (49) and Katie George (23) both playing a role, before veteran Charlotte Edwards entered the fray with 30 runs still required.

Edwards was skilfully able to force the pace, with traces of the old brilliance still very much apparent as she found the boundary rope with a drive for four.

She was eventually run out backing up for 14, but Ariana Dowse finished things off the very next ball, pulling Georgie Boyce for four runs through square leg – Hampshire ending with a 4 wicket win.

Earlier Notts had accumulated the highest Div 1 total of the day, putting 186 runs on the board despite losing their last 6 wickets for 40 runs.

Sonia Odedra (50) and Jodie Dibble (44) formed the backbone of the innings, with both batsmen riding their luck in a partnership of 80 as several catches went begging.

For Hampshire, who by taking 9 wickets secured maximum bowling bonus points, it was 17-year-old Charlie Dean (3-31) who took the bowling honours, removing top-scorer Odedra just after she had reached her half-century, and taking a fantastic diving catch to dismiss Lucy Higham caught and bowled.

Speaking to CRICKETher after close of play Suzie Bates acknowledged that Hampshire had improvements to make but said that the win was the most important thing:

“We didn’t field as well as we would have liked but we managed to come back and keep them to a score that we felt we could chase.”

“We got off to a good start with the bat but lacked intent at times – it was probably a bit closer than we would have liked, but it’s nice to get the first win under our belts.”

CRICKETher has learned that TalkSport’s new radio broadcasting rights, which cover England Men’s forthcoming winter tours to Sri Lanka and West Indies, do not include either the Women’s World T20 or England Women’s winter internationals.

While in the past the rights have generally been sold as a package, with the BBC covering both the men’s and women’s tours, this time around the women’s matches appear to have been offered up as a separate set of rights which were not purchased by TalkSport.

The WWT20 will take place in West Indies in November as a standalone women’s tournament. In addition, the Women’s International Championship dictates that England will play at least 3 ODIs over the winter, though the formal schedule has yet to be announced.

This potentially leaves the way open for the BBC to bid for the broadcasting rights for these matches, which could help to fill the hole in their schedules which the loss of these men’s overseas tours has created.

Today the ECB have announced that what we thought would be the new city T20 franchise league will actually be an 8-team domestic competition played according to the totally-not-tried-and-tested format of 100-ball cricket.

Today the ECB have not only thrown common sense to the winds but appear to have entirely ditched their commitment to developing women’s cricket.

We already knew that the end of the Kia Super League was probably nigh: the lure of a brand new T20 competition, to be played in an aligned way with the new men’s franchises according to the BBL / WBBL model that has been so successful in Australia, was too strong to resist.

In itself that hurt. We – and by that I mean not just CRICKETher but the administrators, the fans, the coaches and the players – had poured our hearts and souls into the KSL. We wanted to make it work, and it did: audiences in their thousands, including nearly 3500 spectators at last year’s Hove Finals Day, were finally paying attention to domestic cricket.

But we could deal with the hurt, because we thought that maybe something better, or at least equally good, was coming.

How wrong we were.

This new 100-ball format, the ECB says, will provide “clear differentiation from other competitions” and be “distinct from the popular Vitality Blast”. The fact that the new competition will blast a nuclear hole through the women’s domestic pathway in England is not so much glossed over as ignored completely.

KSL is the only top-level T20 cricket that our domestic players get. There is a county T20 tournament, but the two competitions are frankly incomparable. The Super League is a paid competition which features the best players from all over the world. The women’s county T20 competition is amateur, unpaid, and short-lived, with each side playing a maximum of 7 games a season. For that reason it tends not to attract overseas players.

And yet this, from 2020, is what we will be left with: all players below England level having 7 T20 games a season to learn the format that is at the fundamental heart of women’s international cricket. It is farcical.

Clare Connor states in the press release that for women players this competition represents “an exciting stage upon which to display their talent”. But will players like Sophie Devine and Meg Lanning really want to come to England to play “100-ball cricket”? Why would they? Do the ICC have plans to introduce a 100-ball World Cup?

3 years ago, when plans for the Super League were first announced, I was so excited. I wrote that there was “much to celebrate, and much to look forward to”. It felt like the development of the women’s game was being made a priority.

Today, as I read incredulously through the ECB’s press release, all I could see was the total lack of consideration that those high up making these decisions have given to the women’s game. Make no mistake: for women’s cricket, 100-ball cricket is a nuclear disaster waiting to happen.

See also: The 100 Is English Cricket’s Vietnam

If there is one thing Alex Blackwell is known for, it is speaking up for what she believes in. When I interview her weeks on from the announcement of her retirement from international cricket, it is this that comes across most clearly. “I’ve got my own moral compass and values that make me as a person,” she says. “I can’t be anyone else other than myself.”

As still one of very few female cricketers who has felt able to be open about her sexuality – she married her partner, former England cricketer Lynsey Askew, in 2015 – Blackwell is keen to encourage others in the sport to follow in her footsteps. “What I’ve tried to do is break the silence. From my point of view I feel like while athletes are really comfortable to be themselves in their closed circles that’s wonderful, but there seems to be a bit of a silence about who people really are outside the sport.”

“It’s not always going to be possible for individuals to be completely transparent, but I do want to endorse that teams should continue to strive to be really inclusive and really welcoming, and celebrate everyone’s differences, because that gets the best out of those individuals and teams in terms of performance.”

This was one of the key reasons, she says, why she chose to come out publicly about her relationship with Lynsey. “I knew that being my whole, authentic and transparent self in every aspect of my life was going to allow me to perform better. And I honestly believe that without being my true self I wouldn’t have reached the heights I have.”

They are quite some heights. Blackwell first represented Australia in 2003, as a 19 year old. She was part of 5 World Cup winning teams and finished her career with 5250 runs to her name and 251 caps across all three formats, the most of any Australian female cricketer, ever. Just last summer she almost (but not quite) turned the 2017 World Cup semi-final on its head, in a record-breaking 10th-wicket partnership with Kristen Beams. She cites the 90 runs she made in that match as “probably her best ever effort with the bat for Australia”.

Recently ranked as the fifth best batsman in world cricket, her retirement rather took everyone by surprise; but she says it was the culmination of a lengthy thought process. “It’s something I’ve been thinking about for many years. Before the Ashes series in 2015 I was thinking, ‘could this be my last series?’ It could have been.”

She is, understandably, tight-lipped when I broach the subject of the appointment of Rachael Haynes ahead of Blackwell as stand-in captain for Meg Lanning during last year’s World Cup and Ashes series. She seems sanguine about the whole affair: “Captaincy’s not something that anyone has the right to,” she says. “It’s a decision that was made and the team just has to get on with doing the best job in whatever role they have.” But she was, after all, Australia’s official vice-captain, had done the deputy’s job for 7 years, and had led Australia to victory in the 2010 WWT20, standing in for Jodie Fields.

She says she is “very proud” of what she achieved as captain of both Australia and the New South Wales Breakers, who she captained to 7 state titles. What she doesn’t say is that her record as captain speaks for itself – which only makes last year’s decision all the odder.

I question whether she would still have retired, had the decision gone differently. “That’s an impossible question for me to answer,” is the response. It remains a baffling decision.

Retirement, though, seems to have opened up numerous opportunities for Blackwell. “I feel good about it,” she says. “I’ve been really busy. I’ve done quite a few speaking gigs and various events. I spoke at SBS, which is a TV broadcaster and they’re huge on diversity. I was on a panel with Matt Mitcham, an Olympic gold medallist, and Casey Conway, a former rugby league player, talking about the inclusion of LGBTI people in sport and the workplace. And I got 2 VIP tickets to watch the Sydney Mardi Gras. It was in its 40th year but also marriage equality occurred in the year gone by so it was particularly special.”

She was described in a recent interview with Gideon Haigh as a “quiet radical” – but how would Blackwell herself like to be remembered? “As a respectful agitator,” she says. “As someone who had strong views, shared them, and helped the sport ultimately get better.”

Wherever she goes from here, that legacy seems already secure.

I spend a lot of my life in the British Library, reading back editions of Wisden Cricketers Almanack. To get your hands on a copy, you have to go into the “Rare Books” reading room, sit in a special area and – as security – leave your readers card behind the issue desk. It’s the British Library’s equivalent of the Hope Diamond. The system reflects what most cricket fans know, instinctively, to be true: Wisden is special.

Today’s news – that 3 of the 5 Wisden Cricketers of the Year are women: Heather Knight, Nat Sciver and Anya Shrubsole – is also special.

The Almanack, published since 1864, did not feature women’s cricket until 1938; until then, one would have been hard-pushed, reading it, to see any evidence that women were playing the game at all. But they were, and in 1938 the editor Wilfred Brookes decided they warranted inclusion. “I found a good deal of support for the suggestion that some space should be given to women’s cricket,” he wrote.

“Some space” is perhaps an overstatement, implying something more than the reality: one page of the 1000-page volume would carry a women’s cricket report, having to cover – in approximately 500 words – the entire of the global and domestic women’s game in one calendar year.

Occasionally women broke through the barrier: in 1970, the first full page feature on women’s cricket was to be found, featuring leading England all-rounder Enid Bakewell, who in Australia in 1968/9 had become the first cricketer to score 1000 runs and take 100 wickets on tour. But such coverage was rare, to say the least.

Indeed the standing joke was that the women’s cricket page was to be found languishing near the back of the 1000-page volume, right next to the obituaries. Joking about it was the women’s cricket community’s way of shrugging off the fact that their achievements were often given less space than the Eton v Harrow fixture at Lords.

When Roedean School in Brighton submitted their averages for inclusion in the schools section of the 1991 edition, the editor Graeme Wright said they had presented him with “an editorial dilemma”. It was, apparently, shocking to believe that a girls public school might wish to feature alongside their male counterparts. (They were included, reluctantly, in the 1992 Almanack.)

Gradually in recent years more women have featured within the pages of the Almanack, including – in 2009 – the first woman to be featured as a Cricketer of the Year, Claire Taylor. Then editor Scyld Berry wrote that “there is no element of political correctness or publicity-seeking about her selection. The best cricketers in the country should be recognised, irrespective of gender.” Five years later, in 2014, Charlotte Edwards received the same honour. Still, though, a closer look at Almanacks in the decade between 2000 and 2010 reveals that more words were sometimes devoted to “cricketing wives” than any woman worthy of inclusion on her own merit.

It was not until 2015 that a full “women’s cricket” section was introduced, in the same year as the Leading Woman Cricketer in the World was inaugurated as a separate award – both the brainchild of current editor Lawrence Booth. Meg Lanning was the first recipient; Suzie Bates, Ellyse Perry and now Mithali Raj have followed in her footsteps.

Today, in 2018, we have women not just inside the pages of the “Bible of cricket”, but a triumphant Anya Shrubsole adorning the front cover as well.

There are many women in times gone by who would have been worthy Cricketers of the Year: Myrtle Maclagan, who hit the first ever century in an Ashes Test, in January 1935; Rachael Heyhoe-Flint, who in 1973 organised and starred in the first ever cricket World Cup; Cathryn Fitzpatrick, still the fastest bowler to have played the women’s game. To have ignored them has always been Wisden’s loss, not theirs.

Today, though, is a time to look forward, not back. This is not the end of the story for women’s cricketing equality – it never is – but it matters because Wisden matters. It represents – it is read by – the conservative cricketing establishment which ignored the women’s game for far too long. Suddenly, now a woman is on the cover, it becomes simply no longer possible to ignore women’s cricket. That’s worth celebrating.

In the wake of England’s World Cup victory last summer, one of the questions that was asked a lot was: would it encourage more girls to take up cricket?

For one school in London, the answer is an undoubted yes.

South Hampstead High School has recently reintroduced girls’ cricket to its curriculum, after many years of rounders being the main summer sport, and Head of PE Lucy Kench says that the girls are loving it: “We’ve had requests from girls to do more cricket, which is great. The success of the World Cup was a big thing for us.”

Back in the 1930s, South Hampstead High School was a hub of girls’ cricket; England’s Netta Rheinberg learned her cricket there. But somewhere along the way cricket was replaced by rounders – until last year when, following the Department for Education’s decision to remove rounders from the national GCSE curriculum, the decision was made to revert back to cricket.

Why? Lucy explains: “With rounders there’s not a lot of progression. If you play first team rounders at school, where do you then go and play rounders? There’s not very many opportunities.”

South Hampstead is also part of the Girls Day School Trust, a group of 24 leading independent schools, and in GDST schools across the country the feeling is that it is important to provide girls with more sporting options, beyond traditional ‘girls sports’ like hockey and netball. The key aim is to keep as many girls as possible actively engaged in sport in their teenage years and beyond; a range of sporting options is seen as the best way to sustain girls’ interest in sport.

At South Hampstead an indoor cricket club has run across the spring term. This will continue outdoors in the summer term, when Middlesex CCC will provide the girls with coaching. There is also a London GDST Cricket Hub which organises sessions for the girls with ex-professional female cricketers.

Girls Cricket at South Hampstead High School

Girls from SHHS will also be attending the “MCC Women’s Day” at Lords next month alongside around 4,000 other schoolchildren to watch Middlesex Women play their first ever match on the main ground at Lord’s.

Generally the switch to cricket away from rounders has gone down well, but one issue has been getting teachers on board with the change. “Some people were really against it to begin with,” Lucy explains. “For some teachers who have taught rounders for lots of years, they find it very difficult to adapt the game.”

But GDST teachers have recently benefited from CPD training from Lydia Greenway, who runs nationwide coaching organisation Cricket for Girls and is helping them to understand the best ways to teach cricket to their pupils. “One of the barriers or challenges is getting teachers up to speed with the game of cricket, but also breaking down the barriers that it’s a complicated game, that it’s a technical game,” Lydia says. “And actually empowering them, giving them the confidence, and the skills and drills for them to deliver lessons. They’ve responded really well.”

CRICKETher recently attended a session at South Hampstead and the enthusiasm for cricket displayed by the girls – most of whom had never played cricket before this term – was evident. When asked what they most enjoyed about cricket, answers included: “Being in a team and working together”, and “You work in a team but you keep your own space, it’s nice because it’s not full on tackling and it’s more fun than other sports.”