'Girls are now comfortable choosing cricket': How Grace Hall took matters into own hands to play her way to Yorkshire

And yet in 2025 the 22-year-old will embark on her first season as a professional cricketer - the growth of the women’s game embodied in the twists and turns she has already encountered at such a young age.

“There’s always been women in cricket, just not enough opportunities,” she tells The Yorkshire Post when attending the Yorkshire Cricket Board’s Cricket Collective Awards before Christmas.

“We’re seeing young girls now promoting cricket through Tiktok, which is revolutionary. We’re now seeing this new generation of girls coming through who feel like they’re settled in their environment, they’re able to express themselves and be cricketers.

“That wasn’t a thing when I was that age. Being a professional cricketer wasn’t a thing you could aspire to, and yet here I am having earned my first professional contract. That wasn’t a possibility in my brain until about five years ago.

“So for any girl wanting to play cricket, it’s an unbelievable opportunity that wasn’t there at all before.”

Her own story which has taken her to a professional deal with the rebranded Yorkshire team that will begin life in Tier 2 in 2025, is one of having to create opportunities for herself.

Her family’s interest in cricket got her involved in the sport - her dad was a long-standing member of Osbaldwick Cricket Club - but despite being dragged along every summer’s weekend, cricket didn’t fire Hall’s imagination until a visit at school gave her the spark she needed.

“It wasn’t something I actually wanted to play, it was more that it opened my eyes to it a little bit,” she says.

She played recreationally with girls but for clubs it was with boys teams at Acomb and then Clifton.

“I finally joined a women’s team at 15 at Sessay, a 45-minute drive away but still the closest to me,” says Hall, who decided to take matters into her own hands a year or so later.

“Which is why I then started a women’s and girls team at York, called Clifton Park Cobras.

“Started it with a bit of help from Clifton and York, they were massive rivals, but we brought them together to create a women’s team.

“I knew how I felt at 13 not being able to find a women’s team or people I could relate to and had similar experiences to me. I didn’t want everyone who lived in York to have to travel 40, 50 minutes just to play cricket with their friends, so we created an environment where you could play women’s cricket locally.

“That’s how it should be. The boys get to do it, why can’t the girls? There’s hundreds of clubs in Yorkshire, why can’t they all have a women’s set-up? So it was about starting to influence that.

“And now they have enough players to be able to split off into two teams again, giving us two teams in York to grow and progress in the Yorkshire Women’s League.”

As her own game developed in the Yorkshire academy at Leeds, and life took her to university in Sheffield, something had to give and it was her role with the Cobras she had founded that had to take a back seat.

Still, she can look back with pride on all they accomplished, just as those players and the many Hall has encompassed in her Yorkshire cricketing life, can cast their gaze upon her development with fondness.

Described as seam bowler with a slingy, Lasith Malinga-style action, she made her county debut in 2020 and her Northern Diamonds bow in 2023.

But with women’s cricket splitting for 2025 - Durham were awarded the Diamonds in Tier 1 while Yorkshire are starting almost again in Tier 2 before next year’s elevation to the top division - the White Rose have been forced into a period of introspection.

The chance to refocus appears to have served them well. Rich Pyrah is back as head coach, some big names have pledged their futures, and there are enough Grace Halls to show Yorkshire girls the pathway is alive and well.

“I’m from Yorkshire, I’ve gone through the whole set-up, I want to play for my home county,” beams Hall. “It’s pretty special we have the chance to do that.

“It means a lot to my dad, it means a lot to my family to play with a Yorkshire rose on my chest having gone through all the age groups.

“I remember coming to watch a Yorkshire women’s game at Headingley, if we can give that to someone else, here’s Yorkshire women playing at Headingley, that’s an incredible opportunity for girls.”

Over the course of her two-year contract she wants to move up from being a No 10 batter into more of an all-rounder role. She also wants to help her team prove to the game’s authorities that they were wrong to snub Yorkshire for Tier 1.

“I’m going with a fresh start, I’m back from injury rehab and this year I want to take the opportunity to represent my county and win games,” says Hall, who admits she still struggles with being referred to as a senior player.

“Sometimes the focus is taken away and put into individual things, and as much as I’d like to bowl faster and showcase myself, we want to win games as a team, that’s our building block.”