By Charles Randall
15 October 2013
The ECB have announced that an increasing number of women are playing cricket in England and Wales, probably more than 60,000, based on statistical analysis, research and survey material completed recently.
This claim would probably fit the experience of many of the 600-plus clubs boosting female participation in their junior sections, starting with girls through to adult. Though the nation-wide adult base is still not especially strong, the acceptance of cricket as a mainstream female sport is clearly producing more players, perhaps inspired by the summer Ashes success of the England side captained by the charismatic Charlotte Edwards. The series of a four-day Test, one-dayers and twenty20 games attracted wide media attention.
The ECB estimated the number of female players with some reliability as 63,560 over the age of 14. This is a very encouraging figure, even if a much smaller number would be regarded as a core. The research was based on ECB’s first National Playing Survey, conducted in 2013, which attracted more than 21,500 responses from recreational cricketers, together with analysis of more than 1.2 million scorecards from Play-Cricket.com and feedback from 12 focus groups. The findings formed part of a wider analysis of grassroots cricket participation, which was conducted by Two Circles for ECB and funded via the Sport England Whole Sport Plan.
Sport England research has revealed that 12 million women would like to play more sport. The female cricketers probably account for about seven per cent of recreational players, though nobody can be certain about the overall number of active male cricketers.
A study of grassroots cricket, commissioned by ECB, suggested that female numbers had increased in 2013 and showed that 68 per cent of female cricketers would like to play the game more often, with this figure rising even higher to 93 per cent among those who play the game occasionally in the 14 to 16-year-old age range.
Sunday was rated as the ‘perfect day’ for cricket by 51 per cent of female cricketers compared to 31 per cent favouring Saturday, while 40-over cricket was the preferred format for 25 per cent of women with 20-over cricket rated second by 17 per cent.
According to the ECB study, two thirds of women saw cricket as a sociable sport and almost half those surveyed said they were enjoying the sport more than two years ago. Three quarters of female cricketers play other sports such as football, netball, swimming, tennis and hockey.
The ECB announcement came as the Cricket Foundation’s Chance to Shine initiative, promoting cricket in state schools, is set to reach its one millionth girl during the autumn school term. Figures show that more than 983,000 schoolgirls have taken part in cricket across 7,000 state schools since the project was first launched in 2005.
Edwards, Lydia Greenway, Jenny Gunn, Danielle Hazell, Heather Knight and Susie Rowe are six England players playng a major role in supporting the project through coaching, training teachers and delivering assemblies. About 13,000 girls received coaching in this way via the programme last year.
ECB chief executive David Collier said: "Meeting the rising demand from women and girls for more opportunities to play the game in teams at every level is top priority for ECB and a key element of our new strategic plan Champion Counties. Over the last decade we have made a very significant investment into women’s cricket and we are now reaping the rewards. with the England Women team’s on-field successes inspiring even greater participation at recreational level."
"With more than 600 recreational clubs nationwide now offering cricket for women and girls and the Chance to Shine programme reaching more schoolgirls than ever before, the foundations of the women’s game are strong. Our task now is to ensure we are providing the best possible facilities, coaching and club environments at grassroots level so that even more women and girls can take up the game and experience the enjoyment that comes from playing the sport regularly in teams."