First Blood in The Women's Ashes... To The Progressives

 The first battle in this summer's Women's Ashes has taken place, not between England and Australia, but between the Traditionalists and the Progressives - members of which were passionately represented on either side, debating the question: One Series Or Three?

The announcement this week that the series would be defined across all 3 formats - Test, ODIs and T20s - represents a victory for the Progressives; who argued that the value of the 'A' word in marketing the ODIs and T20s outweighed the Traditionalists' contention that The Ashes means Test Cricket, and should not be sullied by association with the shorter formats.

The Traditionalists did win a minor concession, with the points system heavily weighted in favour of the Test - a decision which I think Martin Davies is right to question; leaving open the possibility as it does that the series could be all over with a whopping four games still to play, which is a lot of dead-rubber if that's the way it pans-out.

Overall, though, I think this is a good decision. The reality is that women's Test cricket is simply not commercially viable - the match at teeny-tiny Wormsley is apparently nothing like sold-out at time of writing - and it therefore makes sense to add additional impetus to the short-format games by bringing them under the Ashes banner.

Now... bring on the Aussies and let the real battle commence. (We've got our tickets for Day One! Have you? If not... the link is here!)