Samantha Barriball of Northern Brave bats. Photo: Martin_Hunter/www.photosport.nz
Professional female cricketers have been relying on family for second hand bats which aren't fit for purpose and now a fundraising drive is seeking to level the playing field through public donations.
Northern Districts CEO Ben MacCormack says over the six years he's been in charge at the major association they have been looking for ways to improve equality across their men's and women's teams.
As female players emerge from a completely amateur environment over the last few years into a semi-professional career as a cricketer MacCormack says they want to have the right support systems in place - including making sure they have the right gear to play the game.
"There was a clear gap between our male and female players," MacCormack says.
"We can see our male players are really fortunate lots of them have personal bat maker sponsors and will have anywhere from five to 10 bats custom made in their bags and what we were seeing in our women's team was a number of them had hand-me-downs from brothers or uncle's or were going to sports stores and buying something off the shelf that wasn't custom to them and we felt like there was a real opportunity to support our female players in getting the right tools in their hand to be able to perform at their best."
The Bat 4 Change campaign will equip the 15 contracted women's players at ND with two customised bats, a pair of pads, gloves and a kit bag for the next three seasons.
"So that they essentially are kitted out for each year of the three years and at the end of the three years, should they have been contracted each year of those three years, they will end up with six brand new bats or slightly used bats by that stage in their kitbag, which will be a great place for them to go forward from."
Photo: Shane Wenzlick / Photosport Ltd 2023 www.photosport.nz
To do this the Northern Districts Cricket Foundation, the charitable arm of ND, is aiming to raise $60,000 through public donations. The Foundation will also contribute financially.
A partnership with Kookaburra will reduce the cost of the equipment under this scheme.
The Northern Brave women who open their Super Smash campaign against Central Hinds on Friday in Hamilton already have this season's new bats in hand.
"They're already noticing the difference in their cricket in the very early stages of playing and practicing with custom made bats.
"Watching the smiles on their faces, just them feeling valued and talking about things like feeling the equal of their male counterparts.
"We support our men's team really well as well and they've been long time recipients of pay to play cricket and our women are just starting to break into that phase which is a really exciting time for any young girls thinking about cricket as an option to know that it can be a career option in the future.
"We're aiming up at equality and I think we will get there over the next period of time, which is really exciting, but also these are little steps that just make a big difference to them as players and feeling equal."