How England won the 2009 Women’s World Cup

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You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 live.

Hello, this is Alison Mitchell with a special episode of the TMS podcast. We'll be looking back at the 2009 Women's World cup where England won their third title and their first overseas as the tournament was played in Australia.

One run needed to win, Suzy Bates in and there's it going to be clipped away through mid wicket and England have won the World Cup. The England squad are jumping around on the edge of the boundary. The two batsmen embrace, but England have done it. It's been a wait of 16 years.

It was the first World cup to be staged under the auspices of the International Cricket Council, marking a significant moment for the development of the women's game. We will hear from Arti Debas, who was the ICC's media rights manager at the time.

You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 live.

Arti Debas, great to be speaking to you again. Tell us first of all explain just what your role was at the ICC leading into the 2009 World Cup.

Thanks Ali, Great to chat to you again. I joined the ICC in June 2007 so this was part of the A New Right cycle for icc. Previously all commercial rights sat with the organization called Global Cricket Corporation that was owned by Fox and they ran so they had all sponsorship, commercial production, etc so ICC was sort of at arm's length. So when they decided to take all commercial rights in house, which means do all the broadcast deals themselves, get the sponsors themselves, run the events themselves as well. You know, like everything, bring it in house. They decided to advertise for the media rights manager. I was hired for that role. And deep in first event was a D20 World Cup. The men's won in September. Obviously great. As an Indian, I saw India winning. You know, I had to be neutral, but never mind. The next one was the under 19 World cup, which Virat Kohli was actually, he was, he was a young, quite vociferous youngster, but, you know, still a great talent. His team led it. And then we had the Champions Trophy, which didn't actually happen in Pakistan because of the instability in the country. It was moved to South Africa. I think it happened in 2009. Later, but before that we had the Women's World cup and there was a lot of discussion internally about how should we position this event, what should we do, etc. Luckily, I say luckily for us, the host of the event was Cricket Australia and leading Cricket Australia was James Sutherland. And James has always been a huge advocate for women in sport, whether it's on the field, off the field. So, you know, it was a great place for ICC to start their women's cricket journey. And, and he actually, I think we generally allocate budgets to each country, but I think they put it, the government put in money as well. You know, they got, got government money in to support the event. They set up a proper local organizing committee. And the tournament director of the organizing committee is one of my good friends, Eugenie Buckley, who's now, I think, deputy Commissioner of the Olympics. She was a force to reckon with. You know, if anything could be done, Eugenie got it done and she pushed boundaries like, like a lot. You know, there were a lot of like, skirmishes with ICC staff, but ultimately it was all to give greater coverage to the women's cricket event and it deserved it.

We should backtrack and explain how it came to be that the ICC were organizing this World cup because there was a merger, wasn't there? Post the 2005 Women's World cup in South Africa, the IWCC International Women's Cricket Council merged with the ICC and thus ICC are now running the women's game as well. You suddenly had a lot more countries sort of under the belt then at that time, didn't you? Because suddenly went from 15 countries playing the sport in 05 to 78 ICC members who were involved in some form of women and girls crickets. So at what point do you recall, Arti, that The planning for this 09 World cup really began in earnest.

I mean, generally for major ICC events and I would call this major. Although that time, I think when we did the agreement, I would say it fell into tier two category along with the under 19 World Cups. It was the first time we were doing it. You know, it was a number of matches that were played. Also the exposure it had had, you know, the audiences. Of course, now it's a tier one event, right? And you can see the evolution that's happened even from, from 2009 to 2017, you know, which was quite historic. But at that time, I think we probably started looking at the event a year out. I mean, I would say for cricket, World cup, men's and now for women's, depending on the hosts. Also it depends on the host as well. Some can start a bit later, but generally with Australia, England, few of the other more organized hosts, and even India, sometimes it is, you know, it could be three years out. You know, the, the start of discussions is setting up of a local organizing committee and. But for this event, I think it started a year out because also Australia were hot on us. You know, they were like, we want to get this going. So actually it was really good. As I said, the positive of cricket, Australia hosting it. They were quite keen to select venues where the event looked big. And I think at that point it was important because, you know, they, we can sometimes be swept away with emotion that, let's get the mcg. But was the women's, was women's game ready for MCG at that time? And you know, we are talking about 2009, which is almost what, 17 years back, you know, 17, 18 years back, was it ready? So North Sydney Oval was sort of the home, you know, it became the home during that event and it was a fantastic venue. You know, you could fill it out with the grand stands. Eugenie did a great job with her team to build actually a separate hospitality marquee, you know, for the final and few games and we filled it up. So it was, I do remember it wasn't a relaxed event because we were trying to push the boundaries. I think the players also wanted more and rightly so, but the access we got to the players was so different to the men's game. That's one thing I noticed, that the players were so willing to build their brand and do whatever. Like they hadn't done some of the stuff earlier, you know, ICC events, bring in stuff like anti corruption briefings, you know, so it's almost like the players were being made ready to present themselves to the World, you know, this was sort of a stepping stone. It shouldn't have been because it was a pinnacle event, but it was like the stepping stone to that big exposure they were going to have. So there were head shots, you know, for the broadcast thing. There were interviews with ESPN Star Sports. We also had SNTV covering few of the games for VNRs provided to the rest of the world. So I think there were a lot of firsts for the women cricketers. There were a lot of firsts for us as an organization that we were doing and we were all learning along the way. And the good thing was everybody wanted it to be fantastic.

One big thing I remember about the visual difference of the tournament was going to North Sydney Oval and the. The ICC branding of the event, which we're also accustomed to now. It wasn't quite the same at the other grounds. And I was reminding myself of where matches were played. Newcastle, Monica, Drum Barrel, Bankstown. There was branding. But yeah, certainly North Sydney Oval was the. Was the centerpiece. So the format, eight teams in the tournament. New Zealand, Australia, England, India and Pakistan were back for the first time since 1997. South Africa, Sri Lanka and West Indies. So group stage and then the knockouts with the Super Six stage coming in for this tournament as well. What about the logistics around the tournament? What else was different for the players? I don't know. In terms of maybe travel, accommodation, would they have noticed a difference from the 2005 tournament?

You know, Ali, it's interesting. Even now, when I look at some other women's sport, I'm surprised that the teams have to play, pay for their own travel. And actually I don't Remember in the 2005 World cup what it was like. But here, obviously the ICC funded the tournament, right? The whole tournament was funded. So team travel, still, I think players traveled economy. I. That's my recollection. There was twin sharing because I was staying in the hotel where there were some teams over there and. But I think all the players said it was like a step up still, you know, and they were. The hotels were fantastic. You know, they were good hotels that they used for cricket. The flights were, I think, direct as much as they could be, you know, to ensure that the players were rested enough when they landed. And just generally, you know, even the commitments that were there, I remember the sponsor boards in itself, you know, it's interesting when you look back, things that actually make you think the game has arrived because Cricket Australia or Eugenie was trying to get this beer sponsor and we were like, no, that's ambush. I mean, if you think about it, that was such a good fight to have, you know, that actually we needed our brand of sponsors. Eventually we allowed it. It was not visible on camera because it was great for the game, etc. But you know, there was actually a discussion about more sponsors coming in you. And so it was. I think it was all positive. They went and the numbers were decent. We had probably two group games, three super six stage games and the final broadcast. So there were seven games in all from North Sydney Oval. And the broadcast itself was, I mean, ESPN Star Sports. The fantastic thing they did was their syndication. You know, I mean, I remember it going to places like Hong Kong, Tanzania, China, obviously the cricket countries it was going to. And they also broadcast it and digital was not even a word then. It was new media. But they had ESPN Star sports dot com. It went on that. So the distribution, I think, changed the game as well.

Yeah, and I remember being there for radio as well. I was following the. The England team to do updates on their matches, but came together with the ABC for commentary on the final. I was looking at was Peter Walsh and Quinton Hull who commentated on that final. I was able to join them. And who else was on the commentary panel? I can remember some of the names that were at that tournament. So who did you get together? And crucially, you know, why did you choose who you did for that women's tournament?

I think what is really important in women's sport is that's my personal thing is we have to be careful about. There's not tokenism that women's sport can only be covered by women. I think it deserves the quality that any other sport gets, you know. So I think for us that was really important. We. But it's also important that people who are there understand the game. So there's a bit of like good commentary and understanding the game, doing your research and coming well. So we had Belinda Clark, you know, who was a seasoned broadcaster, actually, she'd done a fair bit in Australia and she was so good, you know, for the whole commentary panel with the experience. We had Debbie Hockley, you know, who was there. And we had Mel Jones. Mel first. I was working with Mel, but honestly, her talent was shone through. You know, she was fantastic and how she did the work. And then we had Alan Wilkins, who was. Who is a fantastic broadcaster. And actually, I don't think enough is spoken about him and what he does for the women's game in terms of training. A lot of new commentators that come in you know, he is so generous with his time and what he does. So Aaron was there as like the key broadcaster, you know, and then we have, we had experts in Danny Morrison and Vazim, Akram Vazim. That time didn't live there. I think Bakar came for a little stint as well because he lived in Sydney, came to the opening ceremony, I remember. But, you know, credit to them, I think they worked hard. It was a great learning experience for Danny and Waseem. About the women's game, I think Alan came so well prepared and overall, I think the combination of credible voices really helped the event.

Yeah, wilco. I agree. Alan Wilkins has been an immense advocate for the women's game. And 2013, when I joined the ICC TV broadcast for the first time at the tournament in Mumbai, equally again taking his time to, to walk me through how the ICC broadcast happens. I knew the women's game, but he was the expert in the, the TV coverage side of things. And he, you're right, so, so generous with all of his time. What sort of discussions went on, you know, behind scenes at the icc around suddenly, you know, an awful lot of money, you know, being invested in the women's game. Was there completely 100% support or were there some internal battles to be had about, you know, gaining resources for what you needed? Either event wise. Wise.

I think generally with this event, the integration of IWC with icc, I think there was generally, I think we knew that the event is going to be far better than South Africa for various reasons. The broadcast distribution, the deal, the coverage, you know, just the investment, I think in general, because Cricket Australia were also driving us hard, you know, for budgets and doing more and more and more. There was definitely friction, but I always look at friction as a positive. It was good. So I don't think at a board level we ever went back and asked for more budget because we felt we had enough budget. It was the allocation of that budget and where we make it. I think sometimes maybe we were more traditional about where it went. But then we realized that actually visibility was so important because you can make things look good in the background. What was also important is that the players felt this was an elevated event. So I think the hotel selection was important, the they took were important. Maybe not everybody got the best flights. The schedule was important, the pitches were important, you know, to make sure that the quality of cricket was good. You know. Yes, the level of competition I think at that time wasn't that high. You know, there were some teams that were really good, the others weren't but we had to ensure at ICC that the product looked good. And I say product because ultimately fans, their consumers who are going to consume this product. Right. For us, that was really important, that it looked like an elite event and I don't think that that was ever compromised. The friction was more about should we spend a bit more here, should we give a little more budget here. But I think it's always good to have a pushy host. You know, I know it's, it's difficult at that time, but they always want the best for the event.

Yeah. Do you recall before the World cup happened in 2009, the Sri Lankan bus had been attacked in Lahore, the famous Lahore attacks. Did that have an impact on preparations for the tournament? Extra security or, you know, from an ICC perspective, obviously there were, you know, players. I remember everyone in the cricket fraternity just being generally shaken that such a thing could happen to an international cricket team. Did that have a, a bearing on the build up for you?

Yeah, I mean, the one thing I have to say about ICC events is there's a lot of good planning. Chris Tetley, who's headed the events team for a very long time and you know, the security side is always really important, you know, about player safety. But I do remember that because it was personally also it impacted me. We were sitting in our little office, I think it was in the hotel in Sydney and we were working and I got a call from our HR manager because my husband was actually, he was head of media and comms at that time at ICC and he was in Pakistan with David Richardson who was then GM Cricket, you know, and they had just left the venue when this has happened. And I knew most of the broadcasters, you know, broadcasters, you knew people over there, umpires, you know, so it, it was a cricket community that was impacted. So there was an impact and I think the plans were really looked at, the security plans, what impact it could have. But as I said, the plans that ICC builds are so robust, which is why, you know, even 2013, the event, the shift to cuttack happened pretty quickly. This has happened at other ICC events also where we've move, moved India, Pakistan matches in India quickly, even at men's events, etc. So I think it did have an impact. We were emotionally quite scarred by it all because it's the sport that you work and you had colleagues there umpire. One of our colleagues got injured pretty badly and it probably sharpened the operational and security measures around the event as well.

Yeah, I remember doing an interview with Ishigur at the start of the tournament and listening back to that interview. Now, it's largely about the impact of that attack on the players and particularly the Sri Lanka women's team, who would have known a lot of the men there on that team bus as well when it came to broadcast deals. And Artie, you were at the heart of getting those deals done and managing those deals. How did you make sure that when a broadcaster has an opportunity to cover women's matches that they actually do cover them?

Yeah, interesting question, you know, because actually in the world of media rights, what can easily happen is you sell your rights and then the broadcaster, it's their choice what they do, where they broadcast, what channels, what mix, etc. So they have the rights, but there's no obligation. So I think what the ICC beautifully did with the structure of their media rights agreement is they made sure there were obligations specifically for events that were new, you know, like the Youth World cup for men and the Women's World cup, which was new, you know, which didn't have that exposure and audience build. So you could have easily had a broadcaster that couldn't have cared. Although we got really lucky with Star because they got behind it and we worked so closely with them on the math schedule to ensure that we got more games broadcast and less. But we used to make sure there were minimum broadcast obligations of a number of matches, you know, there were five or six. And ensure the number of cameras. What kind of marketing went into it? You know, so simple things like a 30 second promo 45 days before the event should run these many times. And it's not only on Star, it's where they license rights to. So they license the rights to sky, you know, they would license the rights to Fox In Australia, Channel 9, carrots of the matches, because it was local, I think, in Australia. So there's a lot that goes into a contract. It's not just an exchange of money. It's actually and specifically for national governing bodies or world governing bodies for cricket like icc. It is also about growing the game and making sure the exposure happens. And I think the, generally the men's events, I would say, don't really need that obligation, but it's, it's a good, you know, it's, it's, it's good to have it. But it's the other events that need that growth and investment because sometimes you need champions for that. We got lucky actually in Star. We had so many champions for the women's game, you know, but that's true for any sport, Ali. You know, you see women's football or you see women's I worked for younger sport right now, Formula E. You know, where you need champions for the sport. You need agreements that safeguard to ensure that it's being broadcast and promoted well on the broadcaster.

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Did you find any evidence at all that the players were at all sort of a little rabbit in the headlights at all with all this additional television coverage and and attention on their matches that was being broadcast all around? Or were they prepared for it and did they embrace it?

I think, you know, there was something wonderful about the women's event, which is like, you know, you go to men's events and at least the 2007 there are superstars, right? Like, I know the 2000 men's event, Sachin and Sauravan Dravid didn't play. That was a big headline then. But then you had stars like Dhoni Machu, Raj, six sixes, you know, like, I'm not saying they're arrogant, but there is a lot of. There was an entourage with them that travels almost like, you know, the fandom is crazy. And then you go to women's events and, you know, I could just see Anjum Chopra eating breakfast and have a chat with her, which is quite refreshing, actually. I think the players were kind of looking up to different people around them to guide them more. They wanted to understand more about the economics of the sport, how the event would be promoted. They were so curious and interested and I almost feel like that really helps the women's game because they're more aware of what they need to do so. They were fantastic. I remember they had to do these prevent headshots for the broadcast. You know, they were different styles and there was a lot of camaraderie, fun. I think they were enjoying the ride and they were really going for it. They were aware of the cameras, but they weren't playing to the cameras. You know, they were just being themselves. And that authenticity was great. And I think in today's day and age, you could have easily made a Netflix documentary out of it and would be hugely successful because it's hard to find that authenticity. Right. Otherwise, even script unscripted series sometimes seem scripted nowadays.

And did you. Still obviously did. But how did you equate the value of the television broadcast with the crowd numbers for these matches? Because the crowd numbers were not large, even. Even for the final. Yes, more came in, but, you know, my memory and the photographs is still largely family and friends, with some additionals and group matches certainly very, very sparse. So how did those two forces sort of equate where on the one hand you're wanting to elevate and. And take this product to the world, yet on the other hand there was a small crowd in the stadium?

Yeah, I think the selection of the venue and Cricket Australia, again, did a good job. Like, you know, easily there's. And I call this activism, not in a negative way. You know, we can talk a lot about. We need the biggest venue of sport. You have to remember this was 2009. There wasn't much exposure to women's cricket. And this was the first big event, you know, that would get that exposure. So I remember work. We worked very closely with Cricket Australia and they kind of drove it that the venue was North Sydney Oval, which was kind of perfect, if you remember. You know, it had grass mounds. You know, it had one stand which was not that big. I remember the commentary box. You had to climb up the spiral staircase to go, you know, so it was. It was not set. I mean, they kind of created this atmosphere, which meant that on broadcast, it didn't look silly. It wasn't like a 90,000 mcg with 5,000 people and looking rubbish. I mean, for us, the outfield looked good. The branding looked good. Ultimately, it was like, for us, it was a test to make sure this does look good. And the feedback we got. I actually don't remember the audience numbers, but they were not. They were not. Like, it wasn't a disaster, you know, it was actually people but expecting nobody will watch it. But it got noticed, you know, there was. There were Promos that were running people, it got noticed. And I remember the feedback from Star wars next time we like to do more matches. So that was a good win for us.

I remember going to the press conference that was staged for the final and that was again a sort of slightly different experience from 2005 where it's done very normally it was in a hotel with the branded desk at the front. But there was the local television news crew, myself for the BBC for radio and Jenny Thompson who was there for ESPN Crickinfo. And that was it for the press conference for the Women's World cup final. So I remember I did my one to one interview with each of the captains and then the others could take my quotes. So from 2007 the feedback was the host broadcaster, the partner star wanted to do more. 2013 there was an increase, wasn't there in the number of matches, it was a 10 plus the final. 2017 was a game changer again, wasn't it? With digital and streaming. Just explain what happened around that World Cup.

Yeah, I remember, I call it like because these were three ODI World cup women that I did at ICC. I remember the 2009 is, you know, the advent of exposure starting of everything. 2013, I know the organization it was matches moved to Qatar, the venues weren't set. But the one thing I have to say in 2013 is the marketing of that World cup in India was game changing. We had the CMO of Star Sports because the rights had moved from ESPN Star Sports joint venture to only Star Sports and they operated out of Mumbai in 2013. And Gayatri Adav, like she was amazing. Again I say, you know, you have people like Eugenie Buckley 2029, you have Gayatri who kind of the, the marketing campaign was amazing. It brought out facts like who was the first woman to score a double hundred. But you know, so it got masses talking about things. It was fantastic.

So this was to drive people to the television coverage because crowd crowds at that World cup were not. They were quite disappointing I think for what a lot of people expected with it being India. But the TV audience was really well driven.

That's true, that's true. I think the TV side, I remember the marketing of Star was amazing. You know, it was probably better than men's cricket, I would say the, they positioned it but the on ground didn't match up to that. Right. And I think we recognize that. So 2017, when we came, it was interesting. We were always going to do more matches, right? We were always going to do more Matches. But at that time in 2017, I think it was Jan to April, we were also working on this project and I was involved in it with David Richardson and there were a few other people from icc, which was a global strategy of cricket. Part of that was the women's cricket. And we had in April, I think March or April, within the ICC offices, we had a workshop. We invited members. So Sarah Styles, like, for example, cricket Australia had come over. We had members from Pakistan, India, different, you know, women's cricket. They came along and we were discussing. And one of the big things that came out and Claire was also there, Claire Connor, you know, she was a chair of the women's committee. She sits on the chief executives committee. And we were like, we were. Everything was about visibility. And we were like, okay, we just need all matches to be broadcast. It's not good enough not to have all matches broadcast. And Claire and I then strategized about it and we said, okay. So we pulled together quickly a paper, presented it to the chief executives committee. Like, I remember the pitch, you know, talking about ratings and different things. I mean, we presented a business case because it wasn't an emotional case. It was like, this is a good business case. It's not about, you know, it's not a CSR program. And there was unanimous agreement and we got the funding to broadcast all matches. And that was with two or three months of for the event to go because it happens right after the champions trophy in 2017. And it was fantastic because I remember there were so many firsts in that event. That event, I think was. I know we use the word game changer too much, but I think it was quite a moment for the women's game. A I remember the quality of the cricket was really good at that event. And I think we can put on these frills, right Ali? We can put on a great broadcast distribution. But if the quality of the product is not good, you know, people are not gonna like, buy it. But the quality. The opening game was fantastic. I remember in Derbyshire, I was there watching it when we were trying to finalize a deal with Twitter. So we had lots of firsts. We did this thing with Twitter, which they released emojis for each captain. We did Facebook lives. We did ask captain, hashtag ask captain at the post match presentation where fans sent in questions. It was a digital World Cup. Then we had, for 10 matches, I think we had 30 cameras. We finally had 30 cameras, including ultramotion DRS. Was there sort of. I mean, we didn't. Because I remember the north at Newell. One had the Hawkeye red, you know, matte cameras. It wasn't really, but this has. Has had six or eight ultra motion Hawkeye cameras, you know, so massive difference. First time ever at Lords, we use a spider cam. First time ever. So this wasn't like it was men's or women's. We had drawn.

I was presenting on the outfield, do the opener with spider cam swirling around. It was magical.

Yeah, you were there, remember? And also the final there was. I just remember Zara, who's now chief revenue officer with the women's soccer league. Zara was working with the LOC on marketing. And I remember having lots of meetings with Zara because not many people thought we could sell out Lords, you know, and we were quite determined. There were, there were a lot of blockages, I would say in that event, you know, like people not believing in it. But again, you had these group of people who were like, we're gonna do this. And I think it reached about 180 million, which till date also, I don't know whether it's been surpassed because digital now is performing much better. It's bigger and all, but I just think every match some broadcasters, midway, got a bit embarrassed, started picking up more matches because we streamed the matches that were not TV. We did. Sky committed to 14 broadcast matches. So every broadcaster was. I wouldn't say some wanted to do it, but I wouldn't name many of them didn't. And that's why that event, I don't know, it was like a movement, you know, I call that a movement. It was a movement for women's cricket. The quality was good. The digital firsts happened, broadcast first happened in the final. I mean, it was amazing. You know, we. I remember the full house and we were almost quite emotional about it, actually, watching that because people had said, it's not going to happen. Nobody comes to watch women's cricket. And you had families there, first timers, and it was, it was amazing. It was quite emotional for lots of us to see that final at Lords, which was truly a moment for women's cricket.

I should give a nod to what did happen in the final in 2009. England, New Zealand. A late change for England, if you remember, Artie, when Nikki Shaw was called up as a late replacement for Jenny Gunn. But then Shaw delivered a career best performance, taking 4 for 34. Was named player of the match. England won their first World cup in 16 years when they chased down a target of. Well, New Zealand were bowled out for just 166. And England got there to win by four wickets with 23 balls to spare in the end, relatively comfortably. And so a first World cup win for England in 16 years. And on the cricket side of things, I remember that the Australians, having not made the final, started to look at themselves and think, well, how what are England doing that they've suddenly got better? And a lot of that was around these chance to shine coaching contracts that the England players had had in the wake of 2005, having won the Ashes for the first time in 42 years. These coaching contracts came in where players had flexible employment, so they were able to both train, coach, have, have jobs, but it was flexible, so they could also go off and play and World Cups tour, do what they needed to do without worrying about losing their jobs or unpaid leave. And I think that then set in motion a bit with cricket, Australia thinking, right, well, we need to catch up with England. And Australia duly not only caught up with England, they then overtook everybody else by quite some margin. Artie, if you had to, then just look back at where the ICC journey with women's cricket started in terms of World Cups in 2009, whilst the journey started back with the merger, didn't it, post 2005. What would you say is the biggest legacy that has been created from the work that you've been involved in and the impact of cricket? World Cups?

I think, I mean, I work on the commercial side of the sport, but for me, I've always been. For me, it's really important that there's impact and grassroots, right, like in women in sport and women and girls in sport. I'm a huge advocate. You know, I'm not saying this because I'm on this show, but, you know, I've done a lot of work on it. It. I think the legacy is, is it sustainable on its own commercially? And when I look at what England is doing with the 100, you know, I. I took, actually we went as a family to watch last year, this opening game of the 100 at the Oval and was fantastic. You know, my daughter at that time, she was nine, was really engaged in the game. The crowds that came in were different. I think the biggest legacy, not. I wouldn't say my legacy because there's so many people involved. I'm like, really tiny. There's so many people involved in this. I think is. I would love to see my. My wish for women's cricket is that I would love to see it stand independently on its own and actually position itself as its own, own product. Often what happens, I see with women's sports, especially where male sport has been, men's sport has been quite successful. We mirror, we try to say the same media rights approach, we try to take the same sponsorship approach, and that's not how it's going to work because the advantage that women's sport has and people don't realize, you have to see what the USP is, the diversity of audiences it brings, you know, and actually it can strengthen cricket. I think women's cricket can really strengthen cricket and actually save it also in the future. A bit like T20 did. I would say T20 is a cricket format. I would treat women's cricket as a product as well. So for me, the biggest legacy is to say, don't push it out too early, be really careful. I mean, if you look at the 2000 and twenties, there were integrated events, then they separated, you know, let's not let emotion overrule proper commercial acumen in this case, you know, and because that helps grassroots as well. And let's truly think about what will drive value. So I think if this sport and this event can stand alone, truly on its own, without a value allocation, you can bundle events and allocate value to a certain thing. I think that means the, the sport has arrived and I'm kind of tired of people saying it's 2025, we need to do this. And look at this, we need to stop talking. We just need to do things now. You know, the chat needs to end and we need to do things now.

Arti, always fabulous to hear from you. Thank you for sharing your memories of the 2009 World Cup. Arti Debas, who was ICC media rights manager back in 2009.

Thank you so much, Ali, and see you at the next World Cup.

Well, that's it for this episode of the TMS podcast. Make sure you subscribe so you get a notification every time we upload. Also, check out the rest of the Women's World cup podcasts we've done, as they're available on the TMS feed right now, as is the latest episode of no Balls with Kate Cross and Alex Hartley. And while you're on BBC Sounds, search for BBC Stumps while you're there. Thanks for the listening. Speak to you next time. Bye bye.

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