Lord's-based Marylebone Cricket Club amended the Laws of Cricket last month to emphasize the importance of the women's game.
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The International Cricket Council (ICC) announced on Thursday that the term ‘batsman’ will be replaced with the gender-neutral term ‘batter’ in its playing conditions beginning with this month’s ICC T20 World Cup. The Lord’s-based Marylebone Cricket Club, which has been the sole authority on the game’s laws since its inception in 1787, amended the Laws of Cricket last month to emphasize the importance of the women’s game. Women’s cricket has been around for a considerably long time yet the term ‘batsman’, which quite clearly represents only one gender, is still in use. The ICC decision surely is an important one as it includes all genders, however, the decision should have been taken long back.
“The ICC has been utilising the term batter for some time now across our channels and in commentary and we welcome the MCC’s decision to implement it into the Laws of cricket and will follow suit with our playing conditions that are derived from the Laws,” said ICC acting CEO Geoff Allardice.
“This is a natural and perhaps overdue evolution of our sport and now our batters are gender-neutral in the same way as bowlers, fielders and wicket keepers. It’s a small change, but one that I hope will have a significant impact on cricket being viewed as a more inclusive sport,” he added.
The men’s T20 World Cup preliminary round matches will begin on October 17 in the United Arab Emirates and Oman.
England won the 2017 Women’s World Cup final in front of a capacity crowd at Lord’s, while the women’s World T20 final between Australia and India in 2020 drew more than 80,000 to the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground, demonstrating the women’s game’s growing popularity. For the first time, women’s cricket will be included in the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England, in 2022.
Acting ICC CEO Allardice also mentioned that the decision was a small step to ensure that cricket was not a sport that excluded half the population of the world with language choices that are, quite clearly, outdated. “Why not take a small step to ensure we’re a sport that doesn’t exclude 50% of the world’s population with outdated language choices,” he said.
“Whilst some may have made lots of noise against this common-sense change, the majority of people within the game have welcomed the move,” Allardice added.
Women’s cricket has been on the rise on the international stage for a while now. The India women’s cricket team is currently on a tour of Australia. The series includes all three formats of the game: T20, ODI, and a one-off Test match. Batter Smriti Mandhana recently scripted history as she became the first female Indian cricketer to score a Test century in Australia. The Aussies won the ODI series 2-1 but the Indian team recorded a famous ODI win in Australia, which is also an incredible achievement. The T20 series is currently underway, however, the first match was abandoned due to rain.
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