Indian women’s cricket league aims to hit big at home and beyond
LONDON — Sports fans in India will have something new to shout about this weekend as a high-profile women’s cricket competition launches in the country, marking a milestone in the evolution of the game and sparking fresh opportunities for big business.
The Women’s Premier League (WPL) is following in the steps of the hugely popular male version of the contest in the cricket-mad nation, with handsome paychecks luring some of the world’s top players to test their mettle over a three-week competition that is set to become an annual fixture on the sporting calendar.
Franchises for the league’s five sides sold for a total of nearly $573 million in late January, a potentially game-changing sum, not just for cricket but for women’s sports in general.
“The figures are incredible,” Arunava Chaudhuri, formerly of the Indian soccer federation who now works as a sports consultant, told Nikkei Asia. “It is a new era for women’s cricket in India — people are talking about it like never before — and for women’s sport in India in general.”
The rights to broadcast the league have also been a money spinner. Mumbai-based media company Viacom 18, a collaboration between Paramount and India’s Network 18, outbid Disney and Sony to pay around $116 million for the rights over five years.
That is the second-highest amount for women’s sports in the world, behind the top female basketball league in the U.S., which currently receives $34 million a year from cable channel ESPN, according to a 2022 analysis by sports rights consultants Desser Media.
Meanwhile, the mammoth Tata Group has bagged the competition’s naming rights until 2027 for an undisclosed sum. The sprawling conglomerate also sponsors the male version of the contest, and it is no surprise that India’s governing body for cricket is following the blueprint from the men’s Indian Premier League (IPL), which was born in 2008 and has been a roaring success.
The base price set for the five women’s franchises of around $49 million was similar to the amounts set for their male equivalents 15 years earlier. The original eight teams in the men’s league have increased to 10 but the growth in terms of revenue has been faster.
Last June, the IPL sold five years’ worth of TV and streaming rights for just over $6 billion, a big jump from $2.4 billion over the previous period. The latest amount was split almost equally between the television rights, bought by Disney-owned Star India, and the streaming rights, snapped up by Viacom18.
That puts the IPL among the highest-ranked sports leagues such as the National Football League in the U.S. and the English Premier League soccer competition in cost-per-match terms.
Salaries are also hefty. Sam Curran of England is the highest-paid male player at around $2.24 million and while the amounts in the women’s equivalent are not as big, they will still be life-changing. Many players will earn more in a competition that starts and finishes in March than through the entire rest of the year.
On Feb. 13, 400 players were up for auction for 90 spots — 18 each at the Mumbai Indians, Delhi Capitals, Gujarat Giants, Royal Challengers Bangalore and the Lucknow-based UP Warriorz. Smriti Mandhana of India was the most expensive, valued at $410,000. Next was Ashleigh Gardner of Australia, who watched the auction on her phone, while England’s Natalie Sciver-Brunt will earn around $390,000.
These figures, which are for a short tournament, are comparable with the annual salaries earned by the very best women’s soccer players, with Sam Kerr of Australia reportedly the highest paid at around $500,000 a year. For a month’s work, it can be bettered only by the top tennis players and golfers.
The WPL — in which sides play a fast-paced version of cricket known as Twenty20 (T20) that rarely stretches beyond three hours — is also expected to expand in terms of teams, games, revenue and interest in the coming years. Industry insiders predict that the top players could break through the million-dollar payment mark by the end of this decade.
With the money involved and its strong potential for growth, the new tournament is set to become instantly powerful within cricket. The best players in the world will want to participate, meaning that, just as in the male game to some extent, the rest of the sport may have to fit its schedule around India’s.
Whatever happens, the boundaries of women’s cricket look set for a dramatic shift. “[The league] marks the beginning of a revolution in women’s cricket,” Jay Shah, secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, said earlier this year. “[It] paves the way for a transformative journey ahead not only for our women cricketers but for the entire sports fraternity.” -(AsiaNikkei)
