Passive mentality has to change

Well as Ebony said, it is a very exciting time for women's cricket. This week's announcement by Cricket Australia of contracts for the Australian women is timely considering the relatively busy playing schedule coming up for the 2008-09 season.

With such a schedule coming up, some may've found it difficult to juggle their employment with their playing commitments. In the past, our ever increasing playing schedule has put pressure on employers, and unfortunately some girls have had to forego their casual positions due to cricket commitments. Looking from the perspective of the employers, it does put them in a difficult position at times.

Although the Cricket Australia contracts won't exactly allow us to resign from our employment roles, they will help alleviate some of these pressures. I guess I have been very lucky in regard to this, working at the South Australian Cricket Association.

While working in cricket, as well as playing, can become a bit of a cricket overload, I have been very well supported with respect to both state and international commitments. Needless to say, all the girls are pretty happy about the concept of contracts, hopefully in time other countries will also follow the lead set by the ECB, and now Cricket Australia.

Next subject - the World Cups! With our pre-season well underway here in Australia, the World Cup in March 2009 will be here before we know it. We have just had a squad camp in Brisbane a few weeks ago, our second for the pre-season following a camp in May at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra. The Brisbane camp provided much nicer weather [than in Adelaide], and a chance to get outdoors on some turf wickets. Everyone is pretty excited about the year ahead, with the World Cup in Australia in March and the Twenty20 World Cup in June next year, you can hardly blame us.

We are used to things happening quite slowly in the world of women's cricket, and the common response to a small improvement is often, “Well, at least it's something”. This mentality needs to change.

The Twenty20 World Cup alongside of the men's tournament is a major coup for the women's game. The Twenty20 women's international between Australia and England at the MCG earlier this year played as a curtain raiser to the Australia v India Twenty20 proved a great success and gave us some unprecedented exposure in Australia. Not to mention giving the players the buzz of playing under lights at the MCG in front of around 30,000 people.

Let's hope that the next 12 months can boost the profile of the game, and set the platform for the future of the game. At the moment it appears that it is all happening, something makes me think I am at the wrong end of my career.