Tournament a winner for women's cricket future

The successful staging of the CricInfo Women's World Cup by New Zealand Cricket at Lincoln University near Christchurch has highlighted to administrator Christopher Doig how important it is that the men's and women's games get closer as soon as possible.

Doig, the chief executive of New Zealand Cricket (NZC), said the future of the women's game was up in the air.

"Women's cricket needs to get closer to men's cricket and the International Women's Cricket Council to gain support from the men's resources and it needs to carry on the philosophy that has occurred in New Zealand and England with the women's game coming under the men's umbrella," he said.

Not all countries were quite as egalitarian as New Zealand and Australia in women's issues but they needed to be considered by other countries.

"We all benefit from women's involvement in cricket. They do make up half the population of the world and the more people we have playing our sport the better.

"We have to encourage the quality of women's cricket," he said.

NZC was very pleased with how the tournament has gone and he praised the efforts of administration manager Tim Murdoch and women's organiser Catherine Campbell, who is also a member of the CLEAR White Ferns team.

"They've done the work and with the support of our whole staff and CricInfo I can't fault the tournament, even down to the weather," he said.

What was also pleasing was the interest of people who had never seen women's cricket before and their comments about how enjoyable it was, how high the skill levels were, were all positive signs.

The facility at Lincoln University had also been a big bonus.

"I'm pleased the ground [BIL Oval] has come up as well as it has. It was a race against time to have it ready.

"I would like to have seen more of the games with closer results but we have seen improvements in teams throughout.

"The progression of the New Zealand team has been satisfying and I think Mike Shrimpton [New Zealand coach] has increased the skills levels of the side and having the players hitting the ball over the top.

"We are seeing a new breed of New Zealand women's cricketer with players like Haidee Tiffen, Anna O'Leary and Emily Drumm and it augurs well for the future of New Zealand cricket," he said.

NZC also needed to ensure the White Ferns had more quality competition.

"We have to think outside the regular Rosebowl competition and look at a regular international programme," he said.