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Chapter 1: What achievements have the White Ferns accomplished in cricket?
Kia ora, I'm Jimmy Ellingham and today on The Detail, New Zealand's women's cricket team, the White Ferns, world champions at 2020 cricket.
There it is, New Zealand have done it. They have climbed their Everest. They were there in 2010, those two ladies. They have now emulated the winning World Cup team for the women in 2000. They have etched their names in history.
Those two ladies are Susie Bates and Sophie Devine, legends of the game, yet they'll soon retire after two decade long careers playing only white ball, short form cricket. Despite achieving pay equity for match fees, play equity remains elusive for the White Ferns, who haven't featured in a multi-day test match for 22 years.
I'm sitting at Fitzherbert Park in Palmerston North, which is a special place for the team. It's where they last beat Australia in the 50-over Rose Bowl series 27 years ago. The ground's empty today, but there was a good crowd here back in 1999 urging the team on.
Fast forward to this year, and reports have surfaced that New Zealand cricket turned down the chance of a women's test in Australia next season. So what's going on?
I think if you ask players, you ask people who are involved with the game, of course you want to see the White Ferns playing test cricket. I think, I guess the hints in the title really test cricket. It's where, especially our male contemporaries, it's where they are judged. It is deemed to be the hardest, most challenging form of the game.
That's former White Fern turned cricket commentator Frankie Mackay, who we'll hear more from later. Just so they don't close their doors for me. But first, I head down to Wellington and a little cafe on the terrace where I meet a woman whose involvement in the sport spans decades.
I'm Penny Kinsella. I've played six tests and 21 internationals for New Zealand.
We'll get right into it, can we? And that's, should the White Ferns be playing test cricket?
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Chapter 2: Why is play equity still an issue for the White Ferns despite pay equity?
Keep it open. Yeah, keep it open. I don't think it's impossible just with where the game's going and how other nations are pushing it and the likes of India and South Africa are playing more. It's definitely not our priority. We've been told by New Zealand cricket that the white ball tournaments are what we are aiming to, I guess, be in the top four of every league.
World Cup white ball events so that's where they want to put the resource but I'd like to hope that one day you'll see the New Zealand team in whites because although I say 50 over is the pinnacle when you watch men's cricket and now when I watch the women's ashes I get envious and I've said that before I wonder how a test match would test me mentally and physically and yeah it's a shame that we haven't experienced that
Many nations lose money hosting men's tests. So, returning to our Wellington cafe, I asked Penny Kinsella if New Zealand cricket would have to make cuts elsewhere to afford test cricket.
I don't think we do.
My idea would be to repurpose the North-South series that we've had recently re-instituted into a way of preparing our players to play multi-day format and be able to challenge the best players challenging the best players to see if they actually have what it takes to be able to develop those endurance skills, those strategic skills and also using the red ball which is quite different to white ball cricket.
to be able to develop those skills and be ready to play. Perhaps maybe not Australia right now, but a team like South Africa or the West Indies or maybe England. They're on a little bit of a downward trajectory right now, so they might be ready for the taking.
Have you put that idea to New Zealand cricket? And if so, what has it said?
I've mentioned it. We've had a consulting group in the previous regime. It hasn't been reinstituted this year, but we've been able to ask questions from the previous CEO about that. and whether or not that's part of the planning. But mostly it's kind of unofficial. I have been able to occasionally put up my banner which says Tests for White Ferns.
I had it at the recent One Day International at the Basin Reserve and it did make a very brief appearance at the WACA on the day one of the women's test match there before it was taken down because it was unofficial.
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Chapter 3: What are the historical challenges faced by the White Ferns in test cricket?
Do the young girls playing, do they want to play test cricket?
I think they do. I haven't asked that many. There's a lot of cricketers that would say, no, I like the shorter format. But there are also a lot of cricketers that have watched Test cricket and see Test cricket and go, I'd really like to have that opportunity to really test myself in what a lot of people would say is the ultimate test of a cricketer to play Test match cricket.
I asked New Zealand Cricket for an interview for this podcast, but it says the lead-up to the next 2020 World Cup, which starts in England next month, isn't the right time. A statement from its head of women's high-performance development, Liz Green, which you heard me ask Penny Kinsella about there. says there aren't any plans to reintroduce tests for the White Ferns at this stage.
She says NZ cricket is better to concentrate resources on the shorter 50-over and 20-over games to grow women's cricket in New Zealand, a strategy that's proving effective. Liz Green says its preference for now is to focus on World Cups, but never say never when it comes to tests.
To a familiar voice now, former New Zealand all-rounder Frankie Mackay has played top domestic cricket for 20 years and watches more games than most as a radio and TV commentator. I asked her, should the White Ferns be playing test cricket?
That's a good question. It's a really good question and it can be a little bit of a tricky one to answer if I'm really honest. I think if you ask players, you ask people who are involved with the game, of course you want to see the White Ferns playing test cricket.
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Chapter 4: Should the White Ferns be playing test cricket, and why is it important?
I think the, I guess the hints in the title really test cricket. It's where, you know, especially our male contemporaries, it's where they are judged. It is deemed to be, you know, the hardest, most challenging form of the game and a test in itself. So I think when you watch it as a female athlete, you watch it as a fan of the game or a lover of the game, you just want to be involved in it.
So I think if you talk to any players, they would say, of course, our New Zealand representative side should be playing test cricket just like their male counterparts. But there's so many layers that come into it that actually make it not probably just as straightforward as this. There's no first class
There's no three-day cricket, four-day cricket, no red ball cricket or pink ball cricket being played domestically in New Zealand for women. There's, of course, the finance side of things that come into it. And is it the best way to be spending money? Could that be used instead on development programmes, on A-tours? There's so many factors that go into it.
But if you had to just ask me, do you want to see the white fans playing test match cricket again? Or my answer as a fan and a lover of cricket is absolutely, yes, I would. How you make it happen? that becomes the trickier thing to do.
That's so interesting, isn't it? Everything you said after the but, it's the opportunity cost. But if we were to play test cricket, what would have to change, say, with training, practice games, even at the youth level, what do you think would need to be there so we could play test cricket?
Oh, there'd need to be some structure put in place around it, that's for sure. I think when I was playing domestic cricket, I was one of the few players that had ever played with a cricket ball that wasn't a white ball. So being able to speak about playing club cricket that was –
Two-day cricket, when I grew up playing it, you played with a red ball, you had white clothing, you had declarations come in, you had multi-innings. So all the things that come into it are just players, even now who are in their 20s, late 20s, they've never had the opportunity to experience that at any level of cricket, school cricket, club cricket.
So then to ask people to then be able to do that at an international level, that's actually a really big ask.
The White Ferns have played 45 tests, going back to 1935, losing 10 and winning 2, both in 1972. Like Penny Kinsella, Frankie Mackay thinks a North South Island series could be the best way of preparing players for longer form cricket.
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Chapter 5: What are the obstacles preventing the White Ferns from playing test matches?
Frankie Mackay remembers watching on and says she probably dreamed of playing for New Zealand in white ball games wearing a black uniform. But she says it's wrong that so many great players over the past 20 years haven't had a chance to wear whites for New Zealand.
To me, that's what feels sad, is you've got these brilliant female players, these brilliant cricketers in their own right, and there's just a part of the game they've never had the option to access. And it's sad, and it also perhaps takes away from how they are discussed around being some of the best ever.
If they haven't had the opportunity to play the most challenging format, to test themselves in that format, Where does that actually stack them up in the lines of, I guess, New Zealand's greatest or the greatest female cricketers ever? So yeah, it's sad. And it's something, look, it's something as female players we sit around and talk about all the time.
It's one of those things that if the game's a little bit slow on the sideline or there's rain delays, so often you get together and you're nutting out. Who would make the test team? And you're sitting around trying to pick out, okay, who's the opener with the best defensive technique? Who would take the new ball? Who's the spinner that's
got the ability to bowl, you know, 30, 40 overs per innings, who would be fielding under the lid? So the discussions are there, the desire to want to do it with a lot of players is there. And look, I was absolutely no different. You know, I'm such a lover of the game and have watched probably too much cricket, to be fair. It's one of those things that you just think, oh, what would that be like?
What would it feel like to be out in the field for days on end? What would it feel like to be in those situations and to be able to really test yourself, test yourself against the best in the world in the toughest format? I guess I'm lucky having a little bit of a broadcasting view to things as well.
I know when you sit down with the guys after a test match, especially after a test match win, and the way they talk about the game, the way they talk about the work and the effort and the heart that goes into it. It's just there is a different feel around test match cricket compared to one-day cricket in T20s.
Penny Kinsella says she's proud to have played six test matches alongside 21-day games for New Zealand and she has some special reminders of that time.
I brought two things along here, well three things because if you count the bag. When we played cricket for New Zealand, if we were selected for a test we were given a test cap and so that's my initial test cap.
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