Alyssa Healy leaves cricket much bigger than she found it

In the summer of 2006, 16-year-old Alyssa Healy was selected as wicketkeeper for the Barker College First XI – the first girl to play in the NSW Combined Associated Schools cricket competition.

Rallying to preserve the past, a Barker old boy launched an email campaign against her inclusion as “disgraceful”. But the Herald’s Stay In Touch columnist David Dale reported the college’s sports master, Matthew Macoustra, was fully supportive of the niece of a former Australian wicketkeeper, saying she had earned her place in the team. The master also took a brave stand against a “spineless, gutless person” that spoke eloquently about those who preferred the past to the future.

And what a future Healy’s has proved to be.

Just four years after her Barker debut, Healy began a truly stellar international career that coincided with a new era in which cricket was opened up for women in ways never before imaginable.

Healy belonged to the first group of women offered contracts by Cricket Australia. And she certainly seized the day, becoming one of the original players to become a household name in Australia. Over the years, the women received significant pay rises, and in 2017 they were included in the same revenue-sharing model as men, in a historic memorandum of understanding.

Off the field, Healy’s achievements and fame have seen her become an in-demand media commentator with a popular podcast, further proof how much the game has changed over the years for women.

Now 35, and Australian captain, Healy has announced her retirement from cricket in March. Our premier wicketkeeper/batter makes her swansong in the home series against India in February-March.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese lauded Healy after she announced her retirement. “Alyssa Healy is a legend,” he said. “She has had such an incredible career playing for Australia and leading Australia. The rise of women’s cricket, which has in parallel seen a rise of other women’s sports, is a great thing.”