WPL a game changer for women's cricket

As inaugural edition ends with competitive action and big money pouring in, players hail its potential

- VAIBHAV RAGHUNANDAN

In so far as official tournament hashtags go, the Women's Premier League .(WPL) seemed to have nailed it perfectly. #YehToBasShuruatHai (this is just the beginning) works two-fold - the promise of more to keep everyone excited and the thrill at having already broken a ceiling, but wait, there's more yet. For a country obsessed with cricket - although most of India's obsession is with the boys in blue - this tournament's epic finale, won by the Mumbai Indians at Brabourne Stadium on Sunday, may well be the catalyst to change the future of the women's game.

Official attendances in the league have gone up to 30,000, and average attendance ranged from 9,000 to 13,000 for most games at the two venues staging the tournament the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai and the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai. If this was surprising, it was also vindication for the Board of Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI's) decision to allow free entry to female spectators, a move aimed at boosting the number of attendees and developing a broader audience for the women's game in the country.

It has also proved that there remains an audience for women's sport, provided those in charge of sport market it in the way it deserves. "It's really a chicken and egg situation," UP Warriorz captain Alyssa Healy says. "To see women's cricket grow, you have to invest in it. You have to put it on TV, inside stadiums, make sure there are games for people to watch. Once people do that, you'll reap the dividends." Healy is speaking from experience. The vice-captain of the Australian women's team has been among the stalwarts of women's cricket over the past decade and has seen the game flourish in her own country.