About time: Women’s sport is taking over TV screens this Summer

OPINION: It’s about time. This summer you’re going to see heaps of women’s sport on prime time television. Hallelujah!

Australian sporting heroine Ellyse Perry preparing to bat in the Women’s Big Bash League last week. Picture: Matt King/Getty Images

“YOU cannot be what you cannot see” has never had truer application than to women’s sport. And in 2017 — for the very first time — Australians might have a proper chance to see their world-class heroines in action.

This will be a summer of reckoning for women’s sport. Hopefully the next three months will mark the beginning of a landmark year for our incredible, but undervalued female athletes.

It’s about time.

In 2010 the Australian Government released a report documenting the woefully low levels of media and public attention granted to women’s sport. At that time, less than 10 per cent of Australia’s televised sports news reporting was about women.

Horse racing was given more airtime than the totality of women’s sporting competition. (Although that’s unsurprising given that in 2012 a horse was named sportswoman of the year over actual, you know, women who play sport).

But all that’s about to change.

Last weekend, Cricket Australia launched the second season of the Rebel Women’s Big Bash League. Channel 10 televised the opening match of the season in prime time. The contest between Sydney Thunder and the Melbourne Stars peaked at a respectable 637,000 viewers during the second session.

Meg Lanning of the Stars taking a spectacular diving catch to dismiss Rachael Haynes of the Thunder during the Women's Big Bash League match on December 13. Picture: Scott Barbour/Getty Images

In October the NSW women’s cricket team, the Breakers, became the first fully professional women’s domestic sporting team in Australia. The Southern Stars will also be defending their Ashes title in the second half of 2017.

The Football Federation Australia launched its 2016-17 season of the W-League earlier this year, confirming that American sports broadcaster ESPN3 would televise games live.

Chief executive David Gallop alluded to the shift in thinking saying that “Sports have realised that the women’s game shouldn’t be regarded as a silo, off to the side of the men’s game”.

Australian Netball has signed a landmark five-year broadcasting deal with the Nine Network and Telstra that will see two games a week played on free-to-air plus live streaming and delayed broadcast of all other national league games.

The chief executive of Netball Australia Kate Palmer at the time described the agreement is “truly transformative” and laying “the foundation for the true professionalisation of elite netball”.

But perhaps the biggest story of all comes from what once would have been considered the most unlikely of places: Footy.

The AFL has clinched a historic television deal for the broadcast of its new female league and is getting serious about its marketing and promotion.

Network Seven will show one women’s AFL game every Saturday night through February and March, as well as the grand final. The other matches will air on Fox Sports and fans will be able to stream women’s footy live online too.

Next season’s AFL stars. Women our little girls will look up to. Picture: Wayne Ludbey

For the first time, AFL team supporter packs arrived in my household this month emblazoned with photos of women kicking the iconic red Sherrin. It’s exciting to see individual clubs getting on board with the AFL’s vision for a truly competitive and well-funded women’s game.

Of course it’s not all sunshine and cricket balls. Sports have a long way to go in financially valuing female athletes and so do the sponsors who pay the bills.

The AFL’s pay disputes with female athletes drew significant attention earlier in the year and just this week female cricketers revealed they had sign a “not pregnant” clause in their yearly contract.

But at least we’re getting somewhere.

Up until now, girls’ lack of participation in sport has been directly linked to the fact that they’re unaware of sporting heroes who look like them. That isn’t for lack of availability — we have some brilliant Australian female athletes — but a lack of visibility.

If you doubt for a second the power of active and powerful female role models, consider what happened after the release of movies The Hunger Games and Brave. Both of those films featured young heroines who were outstanding archers and both were released in 2012. Girls’ participation in the sport more than doubled the following year.

You cannot be what you cannot see and whether it be in film, on television, in the news or in live sports coverage, Aussie girls rarely get to see women kicking arse on the sporting field. Or at least they didn’t, until now.

Cricket, soccer, netball and AFL are a great start and basketball, swimming, tennis, athletics, rugby, triathlon and others all have positive stories to tell too. The women’s game, whether it is played on a court, on a field or in the water, is finally starting to gain the recognition and the visibility it deserves.

You’re going to be seeing more of Ellyse Perry this year. Hallelujah! Picture. Phil Hillyard

It’s a testament to the abilities and fortitude of our female athletes and to the benefit of all Australians — most particularly the next generation of sports-playing girls.

Jamila Rizvi is a writer, presenter and news.com.au columnist. You can follow her on Facebook and Twitter.