Mumbai: Men’s cricket has World Champions in all three formats, a T20 World Cup and World Test Championships joining the ODI World Cup which started first way back in 1975.
Though women’s cricket had its first World Cup way back in 1973, two years before the men had theirs, they have been able to add only the T20 World Cup to the list.
Though two of Women’s cricket’s top openers — Smriti Mandhana of India and Tammy Beaumont of England — would love to see women cricketers have a World Test Championships of their own, the England star said the conditions are not conducive yet to start the mega event.
Women’s cricket has too few Test matches as compared to the men and not all countries host and play red-ball cricket thus a Women’s World Test Championship would remain a pipedream as of now.
Asked whether women should have a World Test Championship of their own, Smriti Mandhana said she would love to play whenever such a thing comes into existence.
“I would love to be part of a World Test Championship. But that is for the boards and the ICC to decide. Having watched a lot of men’s Test cricket and men’s Test Championships, that would be an exciting thing to be a part of,” said Mandhana, who is India’s most experienced current player with four Tests.
Though Tammy said she too would love to see a Women’s World Test Championship, but that can only happen if more countries organise women’s Test.
According to her, presently only India, England, Australia and South Africa play Test matches. Since 2017, only six women’s Test matches have been played overall with three of them being part of the Women’s Ashes between England and Australia.
“At the moment it is only three or four nations playing Test match cricket regularly, and potentially only three or four governing bodies who can afford to host women’s Test cricket,” said Tammy.
“It would have to be a very big investment from the ICC that I don’t think they are probably willing to put into. They’re still trying to develop the T20 game across the globe, the way you’ve seen Thailand and other teams coming into T20 cricket, that should be the focus,” said Tammy, claiming that countries like New Zealand, Sri Lanka, West Indies etc have not played Test cricket in the last 15 years.
“I think they’re still trying to develop the T20 game across the globe. I think the way you’ve seen, like Thailand and other countries coming into T20 cricket, I think that probably should stay as a focus. However, I would love to see more nations do maybe like a multi-format series like we do In the Ashes,” said Tammy.
She said she would love to see a women’s WTC in future.
“One day I would like to see a WTC but at the moment, I don’t think it would be fair when, say India, Australia and England have played a lot of Tests in the last four years and other teams like Pakistan, Sri Lanka, New Zealand have not played Test cricket in the last 15 years. The imbalance is still there and we need to build it from the ground up a little bit longer and definitely have many Tests,” she said.
–IANS