Taking women's cricket beyond boundaries: In conversation with Vishal Yadav
Vishal Yadav took to his passion for cricket in a way that wasn't through competing for the Men in Blue but by launching his own venture. He is the founder of Female Cricket, a platform to drive the women's game.
While men's cricket has been popular for centuries, female cricket has seen a rapid increase in following in recent years. Vishal Yadav is a proud contributor to the same, having had an exclusive opportunity to pursue his interest in the game and in business.
He has interviewed hundreds of women cricketers, runs his own academy focusing on grassroots training, and believes that the women's game will growin leaps and bounds in the near future. So, let's move on to the Q/A now.
1. Can you please tell us a bit about yourself?
I am the Founder & CEO of Female Cricket. Female Cricket is an initiative that aims to promote and publicize women’s cricket around the world. It was founded in February 2016 with the objective of building a platform that would talk, spread, share, and celebrate the journey of our female cricketers.
2. How did you get involved in the sports sector?
I have always been a cricket fanatic. I wanted to get into the professional circuit but never received the chance to do that. Like every second boy in India, I too had a dream of playing for the country. However, that was a far-fetched dream, and I started looking out for other ways to be connected to this game.
3. What were some of the early memories that you have from your career in sports business?
Particularly in the women’s cricket sector, there were several challenges. Back in 2015-16, there wasn't a lot of coverage about women’s cricket in the digital media, the matches weren’t televised, and the disparity between men and women’s cricket was quite huge. So, we had to work from the very basics. We started with creating a buzz by building awareness and educating girls about the sport. Everything else followed after that.
4. What led you to start the female cricket venture?
Back in 2015, I only knew of Mithali Raj and Jhulan Goswami and had only seen them on TV and the news. I read somewhere that there are 105 countries that play cricket, so I was super excited to know more and learn about these nations.
Soon, I started my research and was shocked to see that women’s cricket was far more popular in associate and affiliate nations than the Test playing ones.
I realized that there is a huge gap and something needs to be done about it. Thus, Female Cricket was born.
5. What have been some of the greatest lessons that you have learnt through your journey with Female cricket?
There are many. Cricket in general teaches you a lot of things. In my 4 and-a-half years with Female Cricket so far, I have had the privilege of interviewing and interacting with a lot of national and domestic cricketers and we have been able to spread their story and create awareness about women’s cricket.
What you see is what you believe! I have had the opportunity to speak to the greats like Mithali Raj and Jhulan Goswami and learn so much about teamwork, patience, and perseverance from them. About women’s cricket, I can only say that it’s going in the right direction.
6. You have interviewed several Indian and international female cricketers. How do you see the landscape of women's cricket changing in the near future?
There has been a positive trend in the way women’s cricket has grown in the last 3-4 years. I reckon that we would see a similar trend going forward. The upcoming years are packed with several global events, which become a perfect platform to market the sport. With the introduction of Women’s IPL in the near future, the game will grow manifold.
7. How can we as a country improve women's cricket? Where does your organisation fit into this picture?
Any and every progress starts at the grassroots. For women’s cricket to grow and prosper from here, we need to go back, look at our grassroots structure, increase our bench strength, and incorporate school level cricket for girls.
A proper plan needs to be built that caters to every aspect of an athlete’s journey - right from proper training to gears, nutrition, and mental health, etc.
At Female Cricket, we plan to nurture the talents at grassroots and give them enough exposure early on. We run the ‘Female Cricket Academy,’ which is a platform exclusively for girls where they train and learn the basics of the game.
We have our center in Mumbai at the moment. We plan to have similar centers across India in the coming future. The talents living in Tier-3 & Tier-4 cities of India are always deprived of such opportunities and we wish to bridge this gap through the ‘Female Cricket Academy.’
8. What advice could you give to other women's sports players?
Start early - would be the first advice to any sportsperson because that allows you enough time to experiment, make mistakes, learn, and grow from it. The competition in women’s cricket has seen a huge rise, and it will continue to grow from here. The other advice would be to seek the right guidance. Be it any sport, the initial training and coaching are of paramount importance.
9. Now, what could you tell the aspiring entrepreneurs in the sports business to improve their skills?
Well, the first suggestion would be to identify your interest and then choose the sport that you want to venture into. Secondly, you have to have a lot of patience. So hold on, put your head down, and keep working towards your goal.
The final advice would be to have a long-term vision and see how is your business solving the existing problems and creating a positive impact on society.
10. What are your future goals?
To inspire 1 million girls across the world to take up cricket in the next 5 years. To establish efficient training facilities for girls around the country to train and up-skill their game. To make Female Cricket a platform that offers a 360 degree solution to everything related to women’s cricket.
