Riding on standalone Women's T20 World Cup success, ICC looks to separate men's, women's rights

The Women’s T20 World Cup 2020 has made the International Cricket Council (ICC) to look at uncoupling the rights of the men’s and women’s global tournaments in order to capitalise on the growing popularity and interest in women’s cricket, The Telegraph reported on Saturday (April 4).

Previously the rights of the women’s events were sold with that of men’s, turning it into a package. But the ICC now believes that the women’s game may be well off by having separate rights for the 2023-31 cycle, especially after the final of the T20 World Cup played last month, which 86,174 people attended.

“All of our data points over the last three years have shown us that fans are interested in women’s cricket. Our global market research shows that 70 per cent of our one billion plus fans want to see more women’s cricket,” said Manu Sawhney, CEO of the ICC.

“There is an audience for women’s cricket out there and rights holders along with broadcasters and brands are starting to realise that. There is a clear opportunity here for the sport and we are currently exploring various options to optimise value generation including the unbundling of women’s rights.”

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Ever since the first edition of the Women’s T20 World Cup was played in 2009, it was clubbed along with the men’s tournament. Only in 2018 and 2020, the women’s competitions were held as standalone events. The 2023-31 cycle is to have eight women’s global events, the same number as men’s. On the ICC’s digital channels alone, there were 1.1 billion total video views for the T20 World Cup, 10 times more than the previous record for any women’s event.

The measure of selling the women’s rights separately is looked at for galvanizing interest in women’s cricket more. This means that the broadcasters would specifically bid for women’s games than getting them as a package along with men’s events. Other competitions like Fifa Women’s World Cup 2019 and World Rugby have also gone the similar way.

“We want to build a long-term sustainable foundation for the game and commercialisation is a central plank of that which is why we are exploring the unbundling of rights,” said Sawhney. “We need to take a step forward and for me that is not about the value of the rights in the first instance, but positioning them as commercial product that delivers value on its own.”

“Look at Billie Jean King and the Original Nine, their first contract was for $1 but it was a leap of faith that drove transformational change. Doing what we’ve always done will not achieve that. As broadcasters and brands start to invest specifically in women’s sport then promotional budgets will follow. This third-party promotion combined with the reinvestment of income will help our aspiration to accelerate the growth of the game.”