Enough room for separate WBBL, WIPL windows in the future, says Lisa Sthalekar

Former Australia cricketer Lisa Sthalekar expressed her disappointment over the postponement of the 2021 World Cup in New Zealand and feels women’s cricket shouldn’t lose the momentum it generated with the T20 World Cup in Australia.

“As for the postponement, I was a little bit surprised, probably like everyone else given the fact that it was in New Zealand,” ESPNCricinfo quoted Sthalekar saying while speaking at the press conference before the worldwide premiere of Beyond Boundary, the ICC's documentary on T20 World Cup 2020 on Friday(August 14).

Sthalekar's disappointment was writ large, specially after the high of the tournament in Australia. But she understood that it was the Women's World Cup Qualifier, which was originally scheduled to be played in Sri Lanka in July, which couldn't find a room to be held and eventually played a part in the postponement of the 2021 event.

“If you look at teams like, say, Ireland, or Bangladesh, or the USA, who are in the qualifiers - how much cricket have they had?" she reasoned.

"A lot of them are in lockdown, a lot of them haven't yet been able to get to a training center to roll their arm over; they are all doing fitness in their own houses. I guess we all got to be fair, but no one knows how long this is going to go on for. At some point, you don't want to lose all of the momentum. At some point, everyone's got to bite the bullet and make do with whatever we can get in the situation we are put in.”

The decision to conduct the Women’s T20 Challenge at the same as the Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL) by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) invited criticism from various quarters. Sthalekar, who represented Australia in 125 ODIs, said she understands why the tournament needs to be conducted alongside the Indian Premier League (IPL) this year, but urged the cricket boards to work towards creating separate windows for the domestic franchise once the situation becomes normal post COVID-19 pandemic.

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“You have got to look at this situation as quite unique and different. The IPL is not supposed to be held at this time, so it wouldn't normally clash," she said.

"You can feel that the powers that be may have found a formula that works predominantly more for Indian domestic cricket at that time because all eyes are looking at the IPL; it's the biggest vehicle for visibility. So, I can understand why they wanted to continue to hold it (Women’s T20 Challenge) during that window.”

The Women's T20 Challenge is slated to be held in the first week of November while the WBBL will begin on October 17. This means that the schedules clash, although the former is a four-match affair only.

“The unfortunate part is there is already a WBBL competition taking place. They could have done two things," added Sthalekar further, stating the BCCI could have held the competition in December, when many international players would have been available.

“But selfishly, from an Indian domestic point of view, it's giving those players a chance to play more cricket and potentially opening up a few more nodes for players on the fringe, who might get a chance. And that will, hopefully, allow the BCCI to see there is enough depth for the board to have a full-fledged women's IPL-style competition next year and then everyone can join in at the proper time, in April-May."

“Once we are out of this pandemic, this is where the ICC and the Women's Committee can come into it, the national boards should start to have separate windows for these domestic competitions. The great thing about women's cricket is the calendar is not jam-packed. We have enough room to play international series and in other months domestic competitions to ensure that you get the best players there and the best product and keep growing the game. I genuinely believe we will get to that place whenever we get back to normality,” Sthalekar concluded.