The Cricket Dilemma: Men love to play, but women have a hard time excelling at the sport.
The Cricket Dilemma: Men love to play, but women have a hard time excelling at the sport. Cricket is the most popular sport in India, but women who play cricket have a very different experience as they move up the ranks. So why has the growth of men’s cricket been slower than the growth of women’s cricket?
Sanjeev Verma thought that Shafali’s only chance of getting into the cricket academy was if she cut her hair short and put on a boy’s clothes. This story was told over and over again by the media, especially since Shafali was able to work her way through the system and make it to the Indian national team. But the more important question is, how many Shafalis stopped playing cricket when they were kids?
Ground Situations
Social barriers are still high for girls who want to play sports, especially in India. Family, school, and the whole neighborhood have an effect on whether or not a girl joins a sports program. “Until a child turns 12 and enters puberty, there is no difference between a boy and girl. Even at the Under-12 level, I have observed very few girls play cricket since parents and school leaders find irrelevant reasons to discourage the young girls due to lack of awareness,” said Sharadha Sridharan, a cricket player in Tamil Nadu who played both Senior and U-19 cricket.
Beyond personal stories and small bits of evidence, people all over India made similar observations. For example, Sportz Village conducted an extensive survey with more than 800 coaches and found that 72% of girls were made fun of while learning the sport.
“Playing a sport is supposed to be fun for children. However, negative experiences lead to a ripple effect in the negative direction. Our research survey found that 64% of girls withdraw from the cricket program once they learn about their friends pulling out due to a bad experience,” said Parminder Gill, Co-Founder of Sportz Village.
Essential Drivers
If we take a step back and look at the world around us, we can see that there are many things that affect how many girls play sports. For example, Jeshwanth, a former Karnataka player and coach, said, “If urban cities have issues such as space constraint, the safety of women, and transport logistics, the rural locations have insufficient role models for girls to take up a sport.”
Girls are more likely to join indoor sports like badminton, table tennis, and basketball at the grassroots level, which is interesting. However, when you compare the statistics inside and outside, you can start an exciting discussion about the social stigma.
“Although sports in India have made tremendous progress in the past two decades, the mindset of the parents enrolling girl children in outdoor sport needs to improve. There is a false notion that outdoor play needs masculine strength,” stated Jeshwanth, who is part of the teaching faculty at the National Cricket Academy in Bangalore.
The way forward: a community that works together
People say that charity starts at home, and it’s likely that some stories begin with a parent teaching boys, not girls, about cricket at home. But once a child starts school, girls don’t have as many role models because most of the sports coaches are men. During the teen years, the dropout rate goes up even more because girls feel embarrassed to talk to male coaches about their menstrual health. At the grassroots level, there aren’t many girls who stick with this obstacle course.
“The key lever in turning things around is Coach Education, which then can be applied on the ground in partnership with the schools and academies. Additionally, we need more women ex-cricketers continuously working at the grassroots for a sustainable change,” said Sharadha Sridharan, who transitioned from a player to a coach.
The findings from Sportz Village’s research survey in schools revealed that enabling girls through different initiatives is the key. “We found that the schools and academies hosting a girls-only cricket camp or tournament regularly have helped get fairly higher enrolment numbers. Likewise, getting locally successful cricketers to visit schools, and incentivising coaches to form girls-only teams can significantly drive girl participation,” said Parminder Gill, Co-Founder of Sportz Village.
Ironically, most of the Indian athletes who win medals on the international stage are women. But the situation at the grassroots level is very different and needs the whole community to work together. Yes, it’s a challenging mission, but it can be done if everyone works together toward the common goal of giving girls more power in cricket and other sports.