Australia's women cricketers have emerged as the biggest winners in the new TV rights deal and are set to receive another guaranteed rise in domestic and international exposure.
A year on from their homes Ashes victory, the Australian women's team will now have each of their home international matches simulcast on Seven and Fox Sports, as part of six-year, $1.182 billion game-wide deal announced on Friday.
That set-up flies in direct contrast with the men's team, who will have only their home Test matches shown on free-to-air television and their 50-over and Twenty20 clashes restricted to Fox.
There will also be a significant increase in Women's Big Bash League matches televised, with 23 set to be simulcast this summer - almost double the 12 televised in 2017-18.
"The commitment to women's cricket is something that is unprecedented not just for cricket but every other sport," Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland said.
"It's an outstanding result for cricket, it's an outstanding result for cricket fans and certainly for the women's game and women's sport in this country. It's a big step forward.
"And we're very confident it will inspire young girls and women to pick up a ball and a bat and play cricket."
More than four million people watched last year's women's Ashes series on the Nine Network but only the one-dayers and T20s were telecast, not the historic day-night Test at North Sydney Oval.
That will change under the new deal.
The women's game has already had sustained growth since the WBBL was first broadcast on Network Ten two seasons ago.
A record 8726 people attended the season-opening weekend at North Sydney Oval last year, while the telecast hit a peak audience of 629,000.
Participation rates have also jumped steadily through the WBBL period, verging on 400,000 junior players last year.
Ten chief executive Paul Anderson stated his disappointment on Friday his network wasn't able to continue its work with the WBBL after Seven beat it in the bid to join Foxtel as rights holders.
"We invested heavily in the Women's Big Bash League, broadcasting matches in prime time for the first time and raising its profile significantly," he said.
"We are proud of everything we achieved with the BBL and WBBL."
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