Plan for women’s cricket to go professional

Cricket SA has promised to take an “aggressive” approach to making  women’s cricket professional and setting up a female wing of the SA20 soon.

This comes after the Proteas’ heroic display in the T20 Women’s World Cup where they nearly clinched the trophy on home soil, but fell short, losing to Australia by 19 runs in the final at Newlands Stadium in Cape Town on Sunday.

 It was the first time a SA senior national cricket men’s or women's team reached a World Cup final.  

There is a feeling the Proteas could have gone all the way had there been a professional women’s set-up in the country.

 Speaking as the team arrived in Johannesburg from Cape Town on Wednesday, Cricket SA director of cricket Enoch Nkwe and the federation’s CEO Pholetsi Moseki said local women will hopefully play domestic cricket as professionals in the near future, rather than the current semi-professional set-up.

 “We are going to go aggressive on domestic professionalisation of the game and, obviously, if it can happen in the next few months that would be great, but to be realistic we are pushing for the next 12 months,” said Nkwe.  

“So, I wouldn’t say this coming season but next because there’s quite a lot logistically that we need to put together.

“From an SA20 point of view, we know there have been talks. I’m not 100% sure but hopefully it will happen in the next 12 months.”

 Moseki said plans to launch a women’s SA20 depend on the federation having enough players in the talent pipeline, which is not the case at the moment.

 “We can’t start the SA20 [for women] until cricket services tell us we have enough players in the structure,” Moseki said.  “The first part is professionalising the current semi-pros. We do hope it can happen as soon as possible.”