CA announces pay boost for women cricketers in new 5-year MoU

MELBOURNE: Cricket Australia (CA) and Australia Cricketers' Association (ACA) on Monday signed a new memorandum of understanding (MoU) which will boost the pay scale of contracted women's cricketers.

CA has announced an increase in payments for all centrally contracted cricketers, with female players the big winners with a boost of almost 66 per cent.

Notably, women's cricket leagues are becoming popular all over the world, and with the successful opening edition of the Women's Premier League (WPL) in India, the competition has increased. Therefore, to ensure that the Women's Big Bash League (WBBL) remain competitive, AC has doubled the salary cap of WBBL to AUD$ 732,000 per team.

Earlier this year , Australia's Women's team won a record-breaking sixth ICC Women's T20 World Cup title in South Africa and Meg Lanning's side also tasted success in 2022 when they collected the ICC Women's World Cup trophy for the seventh time with a commanding victory over England in the final in New Zealand
"I think we will have a few of them [earning a million] in the next few years," Australia Cricketers' Association CEO Todd Greenberg was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo.

After the new MoU, many Australian Female Cricketers will come under the million-dollar bracket considering they are earning well in overseas countries as well. The players who are centrally contracted can now earn AUD $800,000 by combining national and WBBL deals. Australian Female cricketers' 75 per cent earning comes from WBBL and Domestic tournaments i.e. The Women's National Cricket League, now will be AUD 151,000.

The Australia Cricketers' Association CEO, said, "Some of our girls who are playing in India earn significant amounts of money in the WPL, and on top of this deal now, they will become million-dollar athletes. And so they should because they are the best in the world at what they do."

"Unashamedly we stand here and want them to be remunerated at the levels that we are talking about. That is a wonderful thing, not only for those athletes but for every girl who wants to make a choice of what sport they want to play. Cricket is that choice and it's where you can achieve those things," ACA CEO added.

CA also announced that they will rise the women's national contract list from 15 to 18 paying a 25 per cent increase in their salaries.

Cricket Australia CEO Nick Hockley was thrilled he was able to announce the new deal and believes female cricket will continue to grow even further within Australia and around the world.

"Cricket now clearly offers the best earning opportunities of any team sport for elite female sportspeople," CA CEO Nick Hockley said in an official statement released by Cricket Australia.
"I am particularly pleased that this MoU represents another major step forward in the rise of women's cricket with significant increases in remuneration for the inspirational role models of the world champion Australian women's team and the WBBL, who are driving substantial growth in female participation," he added.

In this MoU, male cricketers Big Bash League (BBL) salary scale has been hiked by AU$ 1 Million which will increase their pay from AUD$2 million to AUD$3million, and for players who will be in centrally-contracted, their pay has also risen to 7.5% and the team strength will also be lifted up to 24 players in each team.

Contracted male cricketers in Australia will receive an increase of 9.5 per cent as part of the new deal, with the number of contracted players rising from 20 to 24.