Indian fast bowler Jhulan Goswami believes the growth of franchise cricket in the women’s circuit is beneficial for budding cricketers and has advised the International Cricket Council (ICC) to ensure that there is no clash between international and franchise tournaments.
“It’s a big challenge for women’s cricket,” Goswami said on ESPNcricinfo’s Powerplay podcast.
“We saw these things happening in men’s cricket before, but we never expected it to happen in women’s cricket, but it is happening. And I am happy to see it. The ICC needs to take precautions, franchise cricket is the future of women’s cricket. And that is the growth of women’s cricket globally. All franchise leagues need to be given priority, otherwise cricket will not grow.”
Women’s Premier League (WPL) franchise Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) suffered from a similar clash between franchise and country when they failed to secure the services of Heather Knight for the second season, earlier this year.
England captain Heather Knight has decided to represent her country on her team’s tour of New Zealand and has therefore withdrawn from the second season of the Women’s Premier League.
Recently, Chamari Athapaththu, Jemimah RodriguesRicha Ghosh and Deepti Sharma They also missed the first week of the Women’s Hundred as they were representing their respective countries at the ACC Women’s Asian Cup.
“Look at how many quality cricketers have been produced in franchise cricket in the last few years, starting with the WBBL and also the Hundred, WCPL and WPL,” Goswami said.
“They have brought in a lot of youngsters every year, so you have to prioritise those windows and then you have to have bilateral series. If bilateral series and franchise leagues clash, you will lose quality cricketers. And if you don’t have quality cricketers, the tournament is not going to be successful.
Goswami also stressed that international cricket should look to benefit from the proliferation of T20 leagues around the world rather than hold back their development.
“In women’s cricket, we don’t have much of a choice, we have few quality players in the world. If they are busy in bilateral series, then the volume of (T20) tournaments is going to go down. We should make sure that when the premier league (franchise) tournaments are held, we give them some opportunities and after that we have the bilateral series. It will also help in the growth of women’s cricket. That’s my personal view.”
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