The standard of women's cricket in Bendigo now compared to 12 months ago is "world's apart", according to Kangaroo Flat premiership captain Sarah Mannes.
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After leading the Roos to their second Bendigo District Cricket Association women's flag in two years, Mannes said the evolution of women's cricket in the region was remarkable considering a lot of the girls had never played cricket before or only played socially.
"To have two seasons under their belt now the development has been quite increidble,'' Mannes said.
"From a Kangaroo Flat point of view, even to see the development from November last year to Sunday's grand final - the improvement has been quite incredible.
"The standard of cricket across the board has improved dramatically - it's world's apart.
"It's a great sign for the future of women's cricket in Bendigo."
The women's league is a Twenty20 competition played on Sunday mornings.
Mannes, who is one of the premier players in the competition, said the T20 format is ideal for beginners, but the rate of improvement means the BDCA could look at a longer format in the coming years.
"Twenty20 is a really appealing form of cricket for those who have never played before,'' Mannes said.
"The shorter form is not as daunting as signing up to be in the field for a few hours.
"It's a tricky balance between making it accesible for people versus giving everyone a go.
"20 overs goes very quickly and it can hard for everyone to have a bat and bowl.
"It will be really interesting going forward to see what the league does in the future.
"There's talk about playing a longer form at some point, but how you introduce that I'm not sure.
"The most important thing for the league, and for the development of women's cricket in Bendigo, is to just get people involved.
"Twenty20 is the best format for that and the way the league has evolved the modified rules over the past two years has been a good way to get people involved."
After starting with eight teams in 2019-20, nine teams competed in the women's competition in 2020-21.
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