Revenue comes from men's cricket, unfair if women ask for same pay, reckons Smriti Mandhana

01/23/2020

Smriti Mandhana felt that since she understood that most of the revenue was raised from men's cricket, it was unfair for the women's cricketers to ask for equal pay. She further made it clear that the focus of the team was not on the pay but was to win as many matches for India as possible.

The issue of equal pay in men's and women's sports has been debatable but Smiriti Mandhana believed that cricket is one such sport where the man's game gets more attraction than the women's game. Due to this attention, more revenue is generated from the men's side and thus it would be unfair to ask for equal pay for women's cricketers.

"We need to understand that the revenue which we get is through men's cricket. The day women's cricket starts getting revenue, I will be the first person to say that we need the same thing. But right now, we can't say that," she told reporters.

Mandhana was also very clear about the fact that none of her team-mates were too much bothered about the pay issue. The entire focus of the team was on the all-important T20 World Cup in Australia beginning from February 21.

"I don't think any of the teammates is thinking about this gap because the only focus right now is to win matches for India, get the crowd coming in, get the revenue. That is the thing which we are aiming for and if that happens all other things are going to fall in place," she said.

"And for that, we need to perform. It is unfair on our part to say that we need same pay, it is not right. So I don't think I want to comment on that gap," she added.

India will be playing a T20I tri-series against Australia and England before the mega T20 tournament Down Under.