Sky Sports showcases bumper 24 hours of live women’s sport

On Saturday 2 April, Sky Sports treated sports fans to 24 hours of women’s sport with live action from across the world.

The headline event began early on Sunday morning (02:00) as cricket fans were able to watch the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup Final in Christchurch as defending champions England took on six-time winners Australia.

Sky Sports showed the game on its dedicated Sky Sports Cricket World Cup channel and Sky Sports Main Event, as well as free to all audiences on the Sky Sports YouTube channel and Sky’s Pick channel in addition to being free for non-sports customers via Sky Showcase. For those struggling with the early morning timings, there was a repeat of the match on Sky Sports Cricket World Cup from 10:30, while 60-minute highlights were made available on demand after the game.

Live boxing from the North-East of England saw Savannah Marshall take on Femke Hermans to defend her WBO middleweight title as the main event at the Newcastle Arena. Marshall’s win took her one step closer to securing an undisputed fight with her big rival Claressa Shields.

In football, West Ham United Women took on Manchester City Women in the Barclays FA WSL from 11:30, with the Manchester club pushing for the final Champions League place in the league. Sky Sports is the primary broadcast partner for the Barclays Women’s Super League, showing up to 35 games a season.

Golf fans had three different competitions to tune into, including the first major of the year in the form of the LPGA Tour: Chevron Championship at California’s Mission Hills Country Club. As well as the LPGA Tour, there was also Ladies European Tour golf in the South African Open and the Augusta National Women’s Amateur live from Augusta National less than a week before The Masters gets underway.

Last year, Sky Sports announced a three-year extension of its existing rights deals for both the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) and the Ladies European Tour (LET), with the extension of the LPGA deal meaning that Sky continues to be the home for all five women’s golf majors until 2024.

Meanwhile, netball from the Suncorp Super Netball League saw NSW Swifts take on Melbourne Vixens at 06:30 before Sunshine Coast Lightning faced up against Queensland Firebirds in Australia’s elite competition. Sky recently secured a new rights deal in partnership with Netball Australia to show up to 60 live matches per season.

Jonathan Licht, Sky Sports managing director, said: “Last weekend was a bumper weekend of women’s sport on Sky Sports. We made the Cricket World Cup final available so everyone could watch it, and we had a wide range of great sport from golf to boxing available throughout the weekend for our viewers to enjoy.”