No equal pay for women’s cricket just yet but more money on the table

One of the major talking points around the Proteas in the last week has been the debate around whether or not the women’s team should be paid in equal measure as the men’s team.

“The Momentum Proteas are realistic about life, we’re definitely not in a dream world where we think we bring in the same revenue as the men’s and we know that. We understand that everything is not going to happen overnight and we don’t expect that. But our job is to set up women’s cricket for generations to come and that is our goal. If that doesn’t happen in my era I am definitely not bothered,” said Dané van Niekerk, the captain of the Proteas, at Cricket South Africa’s headquarters in Johannesburg on Wednesday.

The debate was kicked off by CSA’s acting chief executive Thabang Moroe who, in an interview with Sport24, said that it was high time equal pay was established in South African cricket.

The idea was not to take money away from certain players but to devise a financial model between CSA and the players that is sustainable.

“What we are discussing with [the South African Cricketers’ Association] is to have some sort of revenue share model for the ladies as well, so the pay is obviously not going to be equal from the word go, but this is something. It’s a start towards working for something that can continue to build revenue for the Momentum Proteas,” Moroe said today.

During the ensuing debate former Protea Boeta Dippenaar was taken to task for saying that, in an interview with Rapport, that “the men are often away from home and they have many responsibilities. If women are to be paid the same as men, they must have the same responsibilities.”

Dippenaar also said that “you cannot compare Dané van Niekerk with an AB de Villiers or a Faf du Plessis.”

Alluding to these comments, Van Niekerk said that she was disappointed at how some people viewed the situation.

“We do have responsibilities at the end of the day; we are all adults and have a life outside of cricket. We just want to make a good living and enjoy our cricket.”

“Funny fact: I was only home for a month last year,” Van Niekerk said with a cheeky smile.

The skipper led the Proteas to a semi-final berth at last year’s world cup where they narrowly lost to hosts England by two wickets.

Van Niekerk finished with 15 wickets, the tournaments highest wicket taker, and is the only person to ever record figures of 4 for no runs (3.2 overs) in cricket.

She said she was happy to have the hard conversations and will do everything she can to improve the women’s game, especially now that discussions with CSA are fruitful.

Moroe said that discussions with SACA on the memorandum of understanding regarding players’ contracts are at an advanced stage and will be concluded soon.

‘We are going there to beat them’

Looking forward to the English tour, which includes three ODIs against England as part of the ICC Women’s Championship and a T20 triangular series which includes New Zealand, Van Niekerk said that she was excited because for the first time the team had the belief to go there and “beat them”.

Coach Hilton Moreeng echoed these sentiments when he said that with the talent and skills the team had it should be among the top three.

“We need to make sure we are improving on our ranking and by doing that we need to take on teams like England, New Zealand and Australia…For us a brand we are moving in the right direction but we need to start wining these kind of series. I think there is no greater opportunity than the one we are embarking on.”

Moreeng is excited about the young players that are coming through and is positive that the squad selected is a very competitive one.

South Africa has never won against England in England but after their successful world cup campaign (despite not winning the grand prize) the belief that they can take on any team and win is there. And the one thing they can count on is experience.

“We need to realize we are sitting with a group of players that are experienced and have been playing together for long now and understand each other’s game and that helps,” Moreeng said.

As long as the team keeps consistently hitting the basics, Moreeng is confident they will come home victorious.