Girls’ cricket - really cross about this.

[IbizaToTheNorfolkBroads]

DD(10) has been consistently overlooked for moving up from U9 cricket (girls play in a year in their age group in cricket ) to training with the U11 team or making up numbers for matches when they are short. She wouldn’t mind if she wasn’t any good, but she holds several club and regional age group records/trophies! The U9 and U11 coaches and managers know each other’s teams, they train at the same time, and largely come from 2 schools. It’s not like she is unknown to the U11 manager.

For people unfamiliar with youth cricket, U11 is when they start using hard balls and all the armour that goes with them. DD has played in this kit in the past.

The U11 coach was again on the hunt for extra players earlier in the week. When I approached him and said “well DD is available, but you’ve never selected her…”. He said “I didn’t think girls would be interested in hard ball cricket. There are no girls in the U11 team.”.

I told him that dd had played and enjoyed cricket for 4 seasons and would be very keen to progress through the game, and would happily play in pads with boys and a hard ball.

I was astonished at his assumption at girls not being interested, without even asking. Probably explains when there are no girls in the U11s, despite them being well represented in other age groups. Cricket is still mixed sex at U11.

As a female civil engineer, with 25 years working on construction sites under my belt, I don’t think I have ever gone across quite such small minded sexism.

Absolutely infuriating and I’d report the u11 coach to the club as that sexist attitude has likely resulted in other girls missing out on opportunities

Glad you challenged him! This is the sort of sexist guff that needs to be taken on and kicked out. Hope your DD gets to play.

It might have been useful to make it clear in your heading or earlier in the post the very relevant fact that you are referring to mixed sex cricket and not girls cricket.

Most sports have rules about the age mixed sex sports should separate into single sex. As U11 is mixed sex YANBU to expect your DD to be considered. it honestly sounds like the coach just made an incorrect assumption, yes typically sexist, but hopefully now they are aware they will include DD.

yes this type of sexism is rife, really surprised you haven’t encountered it before.

Of course she should have been selected and his attitude is sexist. My DD plays under 11 hardball and there are 5 girls in her team

If he is a fully qualified coach then his club and the cricket NGB would be very interested in his inability to run a fully inclusive mixed sex team because of his sexist assumptions.

Do report him. He is gatekeeping girls ability to progress in sport.

Hi OP, could you report this to your local county cricket board?

Our kids cricket club has girls teams and boys which I think is when they move to U13.

But it's a huge and popular club.

I'd complain

Do women cricketers not use hard balls? Why would there be a problem in a mixed sex team where all the participants, at least most of the boys, will be prepubescent?

This kind of comment infuriates me!! What a sexist and ridiculous comment. Definitely report it or at least express your thoughts to him. Things will never change if we keep quiet.

Good point.

For clarity, cricket is played in mixed sex teams up to U15.

There isn’t a problem with mixed sex teams, but the coach was assuming that DD had no interest in joining the team because of hard balls.

Women’s only teams use soft balls, but it’s perfectly legit for mixed sex youth teams to use hard balls.

I’m going to raise this with the head coach for the club. I feel like this would be the right level for now. He had 3 daughters!

And they probably hated the very thought of any form of cricket and used the nasty hard balls as a reason to bail on daddy's sport.

But that doesn't excuse his presumption

That should have been “has” three daughters - all alive and well!

Where do you live? I'm always looking for girls for our U12 team! The girls team plays hardball, and some of the girls also play in the mixed team. When playing mixed against teams with just boys, we've had managers say they'll get their bowlers to go easy as the girls step up ... we just smile and say it's not necessary, then watch as the girls hit fours!

Agree with having a word with the head coach or the overall juniors cricket manager.
And send a note specifically to the U9, U10 and U11 age group managers to let them know in writing that she is happy to play on hardball kit and very willing to play up (cite awards etc). I think it’s your age group manager who would recommend which players could play up - wouldn’t it be more their call than the U11 one?

But I absolutely agree. He’s displayed a shocking blindness to his bias.

Right on the boundary of S/W Yorkshire.

How on earth do they think girls cope with hockey?

Reminds me of an old comedy sketch of someone going into a shop and asking for various things and being told no, they don't stock that as there's no demand for it. Of course you don't sell any if you don't stock it!

I know next to nothing about cricket but am a bit surprised to learn there are mixed sex teams with 14yo boys and girls playing together. Isn't there a massive difference in strength even by that age? <prepares to be told that isn't all that relevant in cricket>

Strength will be very relevant in cricket as boys can throw much harder than girls, due to upper body strength and angle of arm etc.

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g , cricket moves to ringer sex teams at U15.

334bu - strength becomes relevant after about 13, though not all fielding positions need a lot of it, batting is more about timing than brute force, and accuracy's more important than sheer speed for most bowlers.

The year advantage for girls (Y9 girls play with Y8 boys) should be encouraging clubs to pick them though - my son's U13 team has no girls and I feel we're at a disadvantage to the better mixed teams we play. I think there's only one girl in his district (level below county) squad and she holds her own.

Is there any choice of clubs nearby? I find in our area the girls tend to congregate at clubs which are known to be better, but we're lucky enough to have plenty of choice. Different clubs have different prejudices, not just sexism (though they're all friendly and welcoming to all according to their websites!). We've had to move our son recently because "if he was serious about cricket, he'd be at private school" 🙄

I know next to nothing about cricket but am a bit surprised to learn there are mixed sex teams with 14yo boys and girls playing together. Isn't there a massive difference in strength even by that age?

Strength does make a big difference in cricket as they get older and more experienced, but in my experience in this age group, there’s a much bigger difference from skill than there is from sex. Similarly sized boys can be brilliant or rubbish depending on how accurate they are at bowling, how capable they are at batting, and how alert they are at fielding. So quite often the ability range is far bigger than the “sex characteristics” range. This stops being the case as puberty kicks in even more, and teams tend to have more dedicated players in the older age groups, so there’s perhaps less of an ability range. And people are padded up for safety - it’s not full body collisions like in rugby.

The reality is for girls junior cricket, there aren’t always enough girls for a whole team (this is obviously somewhat self fulfilling…) so mixed groups for as long as possible is great. But not with coaches with the aforementioned attitude!

Take your concerns to the club’s safeguarding officer, discrimination is one of the things they are there for. You should be able to find their name and contact number on the club’s website or notice board.

I know 2 local clubs in my area that have mixed sex cricket teams. The club my son attends goes out of its way to attract girls into the game including a Tuesday night when no males are allowed on site, including male coaches. Monday evening is training for 14-18 and there are 2 girls who sometimes attend, but I have noticed either none of them come or both do. Thursday's is club practice and anyone who plays, soft ball and hard ball are welcome. Females also have there own league for both softball under 10's and hardball 11's, 13's. After 14 or 15 they join the lower adult teams. I think you must just be unfortunate in your club and coaches. Where in country are you?