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OUR AMBASSADORS . . . The Zimbabwe women national cricket team is fighting for a place at the World Cup set for next year in the qualifiers currently underway in Thailand

CAPE TOWN. — In an age of million-dollar IPL contracts, World Cups in multiple formats, and a global cricket audience of well over a billion people, Associate and women cricketers enjoy virtually none of the fame and riches of the game’s top echelons, and are largely motivated only by their love of the game. “I just had to do it,” says Zimbabwe all-rounder Tasmeen Granger of her choice to pursue a life in cricket.

“I fell in love with it.”

Like Wilson, Granger is not paid to play and does not have the safety of a professional contract. She is a member of the Zimbabwe women’s squad that has arrived in Thailand looking to qualify for their first ever major event — the World T20 in India in March next year, which will run concurrently with the men’s tournament.

Granger is part of a new generation of Zimbabwean women battling to elevate their game to the status of the men’s in the public eye. When Zimbabwe gained independence in 1980, healthy local cricket structures helped to plot the men’s path towards Test cricket, yet, as Isabelle Duncan — another notable cricketer — explained in her book “Skirting the Boundary: A History of Women’s Cricket”, there was an “urgent need” to revitalise women’s cricket in the country “after its almost complete decline”.

The women’s game was in a dire state with very few players, no funding and a weak standard. Thirty-five years later, things have improved, though there is a long way to go yet. Granger described her start in cricket as an act of rebellion after her parents stopped her from playing rugby.

“My parents said: ‘No, it’s a guys’ sport, stop that!’ And then I was like, ‘Okay, fine, you say it’s violent, so I’ll play cricket. I came up in the system in high school, playing with the guys, because there was no girls’ team at Petra High School.”

Granger had an example to follow in Bulawayo: Sharne Mayers, two years her senior at Petra, had done the same thing and played for the boys’ side at school.

Mayers was named Zimbabwe Women’s Cricketer of the Year in 2010, aged 18, and immediately made an impact in the national side. Granger was the same age when she joined Mayers in the senior squad. Virtually every member of Zimbabwe’s squad started out in international cricket as a teenager. Mary-Anne Musonda, who, like Granger, is an offspinner and handy batsman, is already a nine-year veteran of international competition, at 24. Musonda was a 13-year-old hockey prodigy at Kwekwe High when a cricket coach spotted something special in her.

“My hockey coach and my cricket coach were friends,” said Musonda.

“My cricket coach was passing by and I think he saw me swing the hockey stick or something, and he spoke to my hockey coach. He said, ‘You should try to play cricket’, and I thought, sure why not. When I tried cricket I actually started enjoying it more than all the other sports. I just got into it, and that was it.”

Two years later she was part of the national squad at the Africa Region World Cup Qualifying series in Nairobi in 2006 — a ground-breaking tournament for the Zimbabwe women, as it marked their first ever full international competition.

Musonda carried drinks for all but one of the games, but she thought, “I’m here, it’s enough. Because with the calibre of players that were there, I knew it was not possible for me to play. Just being there with them was the best. That was pretty brilliant for me. Good exposure, good experience and I really enjoyed it.”

Cricket structures available to girls have improved greatly since the likes of Mayers, Granger and Musonda started to play the game, and particularly since the franchise system was adopted nationally in 2009. — Cricinfo.