England ‘A’ flew back from Australia yesterday after a tough few weeks against their Australian counterparts. The first T20 was a close match – Alice Capsey hit 44 off 31 ball as England ‘A’ set the hosts 129 to chase, which they did with just 3 balls to spare.
But it was largely downhill from there. Australia won the 2nd T20 easily, and though England did set them 158-7 in the final T20, with Eve Jones and Emma Lamb both hitting fifties before the rain came and washed out any chance of a result, it went from bad to worse in the One Dayers, with the Aussies running out easy winners in all 3 games.
Nonetheless, as cliched as it might seem, it is important to take the positives from a tour like this. It wasn’t all about winning, it was about the experience gained and the lessons learned, in particular for some key players who will no doubt be back in Australia one day on a real Ashes tour.
Batting Rankings
Wunderkind Alice Capsey had a good T20 series, but the real winner here was Emma Lamb. Lamb has of course already played for England, though she didn’t face or bowl a ball in her only appearance; but with her performances on this tour she has staked a clear claim to open the batting for England going forwards, and Lauren Winfield-Hill is going to have to have a very good next few weeks if she is going to keep Lamb out much longer.
| Player | Matches | Runs | SR |
| 1. Emma Lamb | 9 | 213 | 107.03 |
| 2. Alice Capsey | 8 | 137 | 113.22 |
| 3. Eve Jones | 9 | 195 | 77.68 |
| 4. Georgia Elwiss | 9 | 180 | 70.58 |
| 5. Alice Davidson-Richards | 8 | 143 | 87.19 |
Bowling Rankings
Kirstie Gordon hasn’t played for England since July 2019, and could theoretically return to Scotland this summer; but continues to make the case for an England recall with her aggressive left arm spin. Having said that, the emergence of Charlie Dean might make that more difficult, especially if Dean matures into a “proper” batter at international level.
Lauren Bell meanwhile seems to have leapfrogged the other contenders in the fast bowling department with her performances in Australia. After being added to the Test squad, she was also the only out-and-out bowler retained as an option to come into the World Cup squad, should injury strike anyone in the main squad during the final two Ashes ODIs. Like Lamb, her debut will come, if not this winter, then almost certainly in the summer.
| Player | Matches | Wickets | Economy |
| 1. Kirstie Gordon | 7 | 9 | 5.43 |
| 2. Lauren Bell | 8 | 9 | 6.02 |
| 3. Sarah Glenn | 4 | 5 | 5.77 |
| 4. Georgia Elwiss | 9 | 5 | 5.84 |
| 5. Alice Davidson-Richards | 8 | 4 | 5.5 |
CRICKETher 
Interesting, England seem to be quite satisfied with the job Winfield Hill does. I guess you always know you’ll get 20-30 runs and a swift, nimble fielder, and maybe an important off field contribution to the unit that we don’t see from the outside and while I can defo see the value of consistency I’d love to see a change there and seed Lamb in to open. Your top 6 batters should surely have recent fifties in the bank. I feel like the tail has been doing it’s fair share of run-making all year with our 2nd opener never making match winning runs.
And definitely get Lauren Bell on the field and into the environment. The ashes are gone, what better opposition to cut your teeth in than the blazing Aussies.
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“maybe an important off field contribution”
Yer – just said on Twitter: LWH is an absolutely stand-up person, btw. The kind of person who would drive an hour out of her way on a 10-hour round-trip so a mate can get a game. The kind of person who’ll have a crap match but still go out of her way to be nice to a kid watching on the boundary.
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It’s frustrating but a familiar and not unexpected series of results. A crumb of comfort that the English set-up might take from this is that most of the Aussies in the A side were either pretty much good enough, upcoming to or recently been in their main Australia team.
Who from that Aussie A team is realistically going to be a new addition for them in the next 2-3 years? Darlington, Mack, Voll, Brown – maybe? Surprised they didn’t blood more younger players to some extent.
Whereas England had more players newer to the game or with not much or any International experience yet. This certainly would have been a hard and chastening challenge for them.
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