Cricket South Africa (CSA) has taken a giant leap forward for women’s cricket. The governing body, supported by the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture and their corporate sponsors, unveiled the Professional Domestic Women’s League in Pretoria on Tuesday.
It is the first-ever domestic professional league in the women’s game. CSA hosted the inaugural ICC Women’s Under-19 Cricket World Cup in January.
South Africa did not make it to the knock-out stage in the tournament but the fledgling side lost only one of their group matches, narrowly missing out on a semi-final berth.
A month later, the world was welcomed to South African shores again, this time for the senior women’s T20 World Cup. The Proteas made history by becoming the first senior team to contest a final in an ICC World Cup.
With that backdrop, CSA has heeded the call to make women’s cricket more professional.
Head of Pathways at CSA Edward Khosa, has been working in the women’s setup since 2013. ” There are opportunities for women now to get involved so they shouldn’t shy away from it and look at it only from a playing perspective, there are other avenues if I could see us where there are women serving women in an efficient way, where we don’t have to check our back in terms of the quality and the service they provide then I’ll know when have turned the curve and that we are building something that could be rebounded worldwide.”
Government’s support
The Department of Sport, Arts and Culture has invested R15 million rand three years to help facilitate the process. Minister Zizi Kodwa commended the federation’s leadership and encouraged other big federations to follow suit.
“They presented a plan after we committed about R15 million over a period of three financial years 2023/24 and outer years we said we don’t agree we think that you can do it within six months. They have delivered within six months, it is not about how much money you have, it is about commitment and political will. We gave the same commitment in the 2018/2019 financial year to SAFA, but we haven’t seen the results. We hope that today will be a lesson to other federations because it is doable, there is no excuse.”
The league
The league will comprise of two main tournaments the CSA Women’s One Day Cup and the CSA Women’s T20 Challenge. Both are targeted at raising the profile of women’s cricket, increasing the talent pool, and ultimately making the Proteas more competitive on the world stage.
And for Proteas all-rounder Annika Bosch, it has been a long time coming.
“ I think it is probably long overdue, it would have been great if it happened a long time ago but yeah now hopefully with time it will be easier for us to compete consistently with Australia and England and other teams who have professional domestic leagues.”
The league will also aim to encourage women and girls to get involved in the sport, not just as players, but as administrators, umpires, and coaches, as well.
Ghandi Jafta is another young all-rounder who plies her trade in the domestic setup.
“It does provide that opportunity because it is now professional that when something is professional it means that it is providing a viable career option. One that you can wake up every day and say that you reporting for work and do that particular activity in that respect. It is going to provide a massive opportunity for a lot of young girls like myself to finally take cricket and make cricket our central focus.”
The number of permanent contracts in Division One will be raised from six to 11 players per team. Teams will also be provided with improved and permanent support staff, from coaches to physiotherapists.
