In a noteworthy move to advance women’s cricket, Cricket South Africa (CSA) revealed that women cricketers from South Africa now receive an equal match fee as their male cricketers.
South Africa is now diving into a remarkable path previously taken by New Zealand and India, assuring equal match fees and a professional league for its women cricketers. This remarkable step places cricket in a unique position in South Africa’s sporting landscape. The transformation involves equal match wages in international games and a shift towards professionalism in home leagues. Cricket South Africa (CSA) is additionally implementing identical contracts for both male and female players.
“What we are celebrating today is not about monetary value but about leadership and political will,” Kodwa said at the league’s launch in Tshwane, formerly Pretoria, on Tuesday as reported by Cricbuzz.
These radical alterations will be introduced during the next South Africa-Pakistan ODI and T20I series in Karachi, scheduled to begin on September 1. The future league is set for the 2023/24 season. This comprehensive endeavor would lead to an increase of roughly USD 2.13 million in CSA’s expenses over the next three years, out of which the government will contribute USD 799,000.
With this proactive measure, South Africa is aligning with the strides accomplished by New Zealand and India in adopting pay parity in their cricketing systems. Australia also substantially upped their women cricketers’ salaries earlier this year. Furthermore, the International Cricket Council (ICC), during its Annual Conference in Durban, proclaimed equal prize money for both men and women in ICC competitions.
CSA’s morale-boosting alterations coincide with the establishment of a new six-team domestic league for professional cricketers, slated to take off in the 2023-24 season. This new provincial organization is influenced by the existing two-tier setup featuring 16 teams, divided into the top six and bottom 10. The latter ten are then separated into two groups of five teams each, following a promotion-relegation procedure.
In this unique setup, the top six teams will constitute the professional league. Unlike the previous system, these teams will be able to contract 11 players, with their remuneration at the level of the highest-paid male players in the second division.
Comments 2