You’re watching a captivating women’s cricket game, except instead of being like any other traditional viewer who simply wants to cheer for their teams, you have actual stakes in every delivery. This represents participation in a burgeoning movement where women now comprise 32% of all sports bettors, a demographic shift that mirrors broader changes in online gambling, where platforms offering everything from to sports wagering are recognizing female engagement as a crucial growth segment. The numbers reveal something remarkable: online betting isn’t simply growing alongside women’s cricket, it’s enhancing and accelerating fan engagement like we’ve yet to see before.
Beyond the stats, the engagement shift is much more than just a technology change. When platforms provide statistics around increases in women’s sports betting activity, stakeholders can easily see an increase of 108% growth and report female participation exceeding males over major events like the Super Bowl, we are looking at a change in technology that allows fans to interact with cricket in a more authentic way. The implications extend beyond individual betting. An emerging standard is being created around how leagues will look to generate revenue and build sustainable platforms for the future.
How Digital Wagering Creates Superfans
The transformation in viewing habits is quite evident when you take a look at the data. Data from the International Betting Integrity Association shows that 27% of fans now develop rooting interests from betting, to the point of emotional investment that extends well beyond loyalty to their teams.
Even more intriguing is how betting maintains continued interest during uncompetitive moments. Bettors maintain significant interest at 49% of attention because they are engaged through active stakes that keep them engrossed with every ball.
The growth of in-play betting greatly magnifies this effect. In 2024, almost half of all sports wagers made were in-play wagers, which creates real-time decision points, turning every delivery into a potential match winner or loser. For women’s cricket, this means fans are not merely watching cricket matches—they are involved in the match’s unfolding drama, as they can continually wager on aspects of the match.
This heightened level of engagement results in authentic superfandom. Bettors are consuming more cricket-related content, paying attention to player statistics, and developing emotional attachments to matches they otherwise would not have engaged with.
Leveling the Playing Field
The demographic movement in sports betting has been remarkable. The turning point came during Super Bowl LVIII, when 51 percent of customers betting were female. This was the first time that women accounted for more bettors than men for any major sporting event, indicating what had been previously captured in data but unrealized by the industry, that women were rapidly taking an interest in sports wagering.
Evidence exists well beyond American football. Women’s college basketball betting handle saw 14x increased handle on major platforms, and platforms are seeing explosive growth in women’s sports betting across numerous categories. Presently, 12 percent of women are monthly sports bettors in the United States, and Morgan Stanley research reports that female bettors may wager more, on average, per bet in marginal amounts ($51.10 vs. $48.60).
For women’s cricket, these factors create new opportunities. Women’s cricket benefits from having an audience that is comfortable now more than ever on digital betting platforms, and is socially invested in rooting for women in sports at betting platforms.
Mental and social factors are also important. Women tend to view sports betting differently than men, often focusing their efforts on:
- Team result outcomes versus player performance metrics
- Betting on tournaments over single matches
- The social aspects of group betting and group experiences
- Educated and informed betting based on a better understanding of betting markets and betting strategies
- Responsible gambling behavior is visible on betting sites
This style of betting interaction aligns perfectly with cricket’s long-form format in that individual performances nested within team outcomes create rich opportunities for wagers in ways that are consistent with female bettors’ interactions.
From Pitch to Profit
The financial engagement extends well beyond individual wagers. The global cricket betting ecosystem was valued at $14.45 billion in 2024 and is projected to reach $36.24 billion by 2033, creating growth that can result in revenue flows that can be reinvested back into cricketing activities.
Women’s cricket is unique within the cricket industry, given that established men’s cricket has a relatively mature commercial model, which caused revenue generated from the betting ecosystem to reinforce and bolster an already established form. Women’s cricket is finding ways for betting-generated revenues to be targeted into foundational activity, unlike men’s established revenue-generating opportunities. Cricket boards are creating specific funds from the betting ecosystem to finance grassroots activity and program development for coaching and facilities.
Women’s cricket is uniquely situated to turn participation and engagement in betting into financial support of foundational activity, as opposed to men’s cricket, where betting engagement is an add-on to previous commercial activity.
Sponsorship from operators associated with the betting ecosystem is another major revenue generation opportunity. In a similar manner to engagement in betting, driving viewing of women’s matches, sponsorship that includes betting operators and endorsement-related commitments also creates mutually-reinforcing visibility for women’s cricket match formats.
Regional cricket boards indicate that revenues from betting enable them to provide competitive wages for women’s domestic competitions, enhance training facilities, and expand youth participation programming. Such sustained financial incentive allows leagues to prioritize long-term growth rather than securing basic operational funding. This trend is already visible in major tournaments, where the ICC Women’s ODI World Cup 2025 has undergone significant prize money increases, reflecting the sport’s growing commercial viability.
Protecting the Game
Recent events highlight both the opportunities and threats associated with that engagement. A recent Telegraph investigation found there was £300,000 of money wagered on a single English women’s domestic match, which shows clearly that betting interest in women’s cricket has become significant enough to require some sort of integrity system.
The International Cricket Council has taken a proactive response, creating a significant range of integrity systems specific to women’s cricket in the form of dedicated anti-corruption units, regular audits, and partnerships with legal betting organizations to monitor suspicious betting activity. The men’s game had to retrofit such systems after corruption scandals exposed threats; women’s cricket is beginning with protections specific to the game being built from the ground up.
In February of 2024, the first female player received a ban related to corruption when former Bangladesh international Shahely Akter was banned for five years after attempting to match-fix. This shows that existing systems identified and acted on an attempt to engage in corrupt activity related to a match before integrity was compromised. According to research from the, effective monitoring systems are crucial for maintaining competitive integrity as sports betting markets expand.
Cricket authorities have also forged working relationships with gambling regulators to create information-sharing protocols to address suspicious betting in real time as it arises, while reinforcing formal regulations that govern activities at the venues. Players receive regular educational training about corrupt behavior and reporting processes, while venues are implementing policies to restrict mobile phone usage in post-season matches.
The unique nature of women’s cricket, experiencing rapid growth and building integrity measures simultaneously, is advantageous to everyone’s goal of sport progressing in integrity. It allows women’s sport to learn from the misdeeds other sports have made, while building gold standard protection systems for integrity.
The only way forward will be to maintain vigilance without restricting the legitimate benefits that sport wagering engagement brings to the fan experience and continued sustainability of sport. Women’s cricket has a unique opportunity to illustrate how sport can utilize the positive aspects of sport wagering while preserving the unwavering integrity of competition.
The balance is not only about protecting one sport but rather developing a model that is easily communicated for other emerging sports to model as they navigate betting engagement and sport integrity. The stakes extend far beyond the individual wager.
