{"id":878640,"date":"2026-09-03T15:58:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-03T15:58:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/878640\/"},"modified":"2026-09-03T15:58:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-03T15:58:14","slug":"ellyse-perry-says-current-womens-cricket-schedule-hurts-games-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/878640\/","title":{"rendered":"Ellyse Perry says current women’s cricket schedule hurts game’s development"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ellyse Perry has called for Australia’s women to be given regular cricket in the peak of summer, fearing the current schedule could stunt the game.<\/p>\n

Australia will play nine white-ball matches at home this summer against Bangladesh and New Zealand, with all confined to October and March.<\/p>\n

The Australian team has not played a game at home during the summer school holidays since January 2025, while the WBBL also now falls entirely during the school term.<\/p>\n

Part of the issue for officials has been India’s WPL moving to the January window, with a common fear it will eventually extend into most of February.<\/p>\n

Australia’s only home matches in the middle of summer under the current program, which runs until the end of 2029, are white-ball ones against Ireland in the first half of December 2028.<\/p>\n

\"Fans<\/p>\n

Ellyse Perry feels that the lack of cricket in the school holidays will hurt the women’s team. (Getty Images: Darrian Traynor)<\/p>\n

Australian players have long pushed for a regular spot in the summer, much like the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne and New Year’s Test in Sydney are part of the national calendar.<\/p>\n

“It’s the best time of year to play across that school-holiday window,” Perry said.<\/p>\n

“People are at home, everyone’s head is in cricket too. There is a lot on the schedule in both the men’s and women’s game. It’s a nice time to go out and watch.<\/p>\n

“But also for them to be inspired to play themselves and be involved in cricket, it’s really important.<\/p>\n

“I don’t know what the perfect window is, but I think somewhere in the peak of the Australian summer is important to carve out.<\/p>\n

“Where and how you do that is more of a strategic planning opportunity that will take some time to find. But we should be prioritising that for the Australian team.”<\/p>\n

\"Ellyse<\/p>\n

None of the WBBL games are being played in the school holidays this summer. (Getty Images: Darrian Traynor)<\/p>\n

There is the view that being pushed to the outskirts of summer also has the potential to stunt any momentum around the team after its dominant T20 World Cup.<\/p>\n

The timing of the WPL means the only real window during the school holidays would be in the second half of December, perhaps in the lead-up to Christmas.<\/p>\n

“It’s not just for Australia and all the southern-hemisphere countries \u2026 to make sure we’re encouraging people to come along to matches,” Perry said.<\/p>\n

“It’s a really tricky one; the scheduling and planning is a matrix I would never want to look at.<\/p>\n

“But it would be really nice for us to preserve a window there where people know the Australian women’s team is playing so they have the means and opportunity to come watch.<\/p>\n

“That’s really important in terms of continuing to grow the game for young boys and girls. But also we want to play in front of a home crowd with good opposition each year.”<\/p>\n

AAP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ellyse Perry has called for Australia’s women to be given regular cricket in the peak of summer, fearing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":878641,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,47934,22255,85,29879,7298],"class_list":["post-878640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cricket","tag-ellyse-perry","tag-international-cricket","tag-sports","tag-wbbl","tag-womens-cricket"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/878640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=878640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/878640\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/878641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=878640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=878640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=878640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}