The world of women’s sport has been growing exponentially year on year and we couldn’t be more excited about it. Women’s sports are finally starting to get the attention, funding and global stage that they well and truly deserve. We are constantly hearing about attendance records being smashed, sporting records being broken, and we are expecting nothing but the same for 2023.
Cricket
T20 World Cup
We started off the year with the T20 World Cup, hosted in South Africa. This saw attendance records being smashed multiple times throughout the tournament, with the Women’s T20 World Cup Final bringing in the highest crowd of 12,782 fans. This is a new record for a women’s international game in South Africa, beating the previous record that was set in the previous match of the tournament.
Australia proved triumphant to win for the sixth time, this is even more impressive when you consider that there have only every been 8 Women’s T20 World Cup’s. England played very well, they left the group stages unbeaten and were the only team in the competition to break 200 runs. England sadly missed out on the final by just 6 runs, losing to the hosts, South Africa.
The Ashes – 22 Jun – 18 Jul
The Women’s Ashes return in 2023 for what is set to be an outstanding set of matches, with both England and Australia on top form at the moment it will be an exhilarating seven match battle. Unlike the Men’s Ashes, the Women’s consists of seven matches in three different formats and is scored via a points system. The seven-match series is formed of one five-day test, three ODIs and three IT20s. The test is worth 4 points and the ODIs and IT20s are all worth 2 each.
2023 Women’s Ashes fixtures:Jun 22-26: Test Match – Trent Bridge | Nottingham
Jul 1: 1st IT20 – Edgbaston Stadium | Birmingham
Jul 5: 2nd IT20 – The Kia Oval | London
Jul 8: 3rd IT20 – Lords Cricket Ground | London
Jul 12: 1st ODI – Bristol County Ground | Bristol
Jul 16: 2nd ODI – Agas Bowl | Southampton
Jul 18: 3rd ODI – County Ground | Taunton
The Hundred – 1 Aug – 27 Aug
The Hundred returns on 1 August 2023 for a third season. The hundred is one of the fastest tournaments around, with the entire competition being held in just 27 days - and what an action packed 27 days it is. With all games now double headers, there are up to 4 matches each day to enjoy. The Hundred has brought in a large number of young fans to the sport, particularly for the women’s game. Each team has both a men’s and women’s squad that both compete on the same day against the same opponent, this format has ensured that fans are there to support their team in both the men’s and women’s matches. This has largely increased the support for the women’s games. Each year The Hundred has been played, more and more fans have been attending women’s fixtures, and we are expecting this to be no different in 2023!
Tennis
The Championships, Wimbledon – 3 Jul – 16 Jul
The iconic Championships, Wimbledon is always a standout tournament. With most of the best female tennis players in the world attending every year there is never a dull moment. In fact, all the most successful and crowd favourite women’s tennis players have competed at Wimbledon at some point in their career. Some of the most notable champions at Wimbledon include the likes of Billie Jean King (20 titles), Chris Evert (4 titles), Martina Navratilova (20 titles), Steffi Graf (8 titles), Serena Williams (14 titles) and Venus Williams (11 titles) *.*Titles including singles, doubles, and mixed doubles
With many of these top names no longer playing, it is time to look forward to the next wave of Wimbledon champions. Will we see Elena Rybakina defend her title and win for a second time, or will Ons Jabeur do one better this year? Or we will see someone new come in and stun the crowds? With a tournament like Wimbledon, you can’t rule anything out!
Rothesay International Eastbourne – 26 Jun – 1 Jul
The Eastbourne International is a key stop on the WTA tour and always has been.
Often described as the Wimbledon warm-up event, the Eastbourne International is the last chance players get to competitively practice on the grass surface before The Championships, Wimbledon.
A few stats to show how important Eastbourne really is:
- Of the last 5 Wimbledon Ladies Champions, 4 of them competed at Eastbourne the week before The Championships.
- Two of the three years Chris Evert won the Ladies Singles title at Wimbledon she also won at Eastbourne.
- Of Martina Navratilova’s 9 Ladies Singles titles at Wimbledon, she won the week before at Eastbourne 7 times.
- Of the top 20 ranked women in the WTA, 19 have played at Eastbourne in the last 3 competitions.
Rugby
Tik Tok Six Nations – 25 Mar – 29 Apr
After the World Cup in New Zealand at the end of last year, there is a lot of excitement surrounding women’s rugby. England unfortunately lost out in the final to the hosts to end their 30-game winning streak - an amazing achievement that saw them go unbeaten from 2019 until the World Cup final at the end of 2022.
The opening game of the Tik Tok Six Nations, Red Roses v Scotland, has already sold out! People are eager to see the Red Roses in action, after winning the competition four consecutive times England are the clear favourites. However, nothing is ever guaranteed, the final game of the competition sees the Red Roses go up against World Cup 3rd place finishers, France Women, in what is sure to be an intense and competitive fixture. It is also the first stand-alone women’s game to be held at Twickenham Stadium!
Find out more about Red Roses v France Women match here
Football
There is a lot going on this year in the world of Women’s football on both a club and international level. Women’s club football is bigger than ever with many of the top UK clubs seeing average attendance of 10,000+ and 8 of the 12 sides in the Women’s Super League achieving at least one attendance of 27,000 or above. The average attendance of a match in the Women’s Super League has increased over 200% this season from last. The same is happening across the whole of Europe, women’s football is growing at a rapid rate and there is no sign of it slowing any time soon.
The key dates in women’s football this year:
Vitality Women’s FA Cup Final – 14 May 2023
FA Women’s Super League Ends – 28 May 2023
UEFA Women’s Champions League Final – 3 Jun 2023
FIFA Women’s World Cup – 20 Jul–20 Aug 2023
We are so happy to see how fast women’s sport is growing and are proud to be selling hospitality to a wide range of these amazing women’s events and competitions.
