A century partnership between Grace Harris and Cordelia Griffith secured a win for London Spirit in the opening match of the 2025 Women’s Hundred at Lord’s.
This was the 10th partnership of 100+ in five years of the women’s competition (full list here) – and the first ever for London Spirit.
Despite a slightly quieter final 10 balls (2 wickets lost for 12 runs), the pair took Spirit to 175, which is well above a typical score in the Women’s Hundred, as shown by Syd’s “ghost”. To put it in context, last year’s highest total across the whole comp was 158.
Spirit’s total today was particularly impressive given that Georgia Redmayne – their Player of the Match in the 2024 final – departed for a duck, trapped leg-before after missing a straight one from Marizanne Kapp.
Grace Harris was her usual self, rollicking along to an unbeaten 89 from 42 balls. A week ago, she hit 63 not out as Surrey romped home in the final of the inaugural T20 Blast: this was if anything an even more imposing knock, which included back-to-back sixes against Sophia Smale.
Harris missed last year’s Hundred for Spirit as she was rehabbing from a calf injury, but had a particular reason for wanting to head back to England this time around. Her recent dominance on English pitches this season, across both the Blast and The Hundred, may prove to be strategically important as Australia ponder their squad selection for the 2026 World Cup (including a final on this very ground).
“I did think that I might not make the 2025 ODI World Cup team for Australia,” Harris told me recently. “So I thought in planning ahead it would be great to be able to play in England a little bit more and maybe better. To come over here and play in English conditions against a fair few England players and with England players is very much a good challenge and I’ll get better insights.
“I’m taking my international career one game at a time, but I’m looking to the future and thinking how I can get the best out of myself.”
Meanwhile Griffith, whose 50 from 29 balls is her highest ever score in The Hundred, matched Harris ball-for-ball until she was caught at long-off with 20 balls to go of the Spirit innings. “I felt in a groove there,” Cords said afterwards, describing batting with Grace Harris as “a nice laugh”. That’s an unusual compliment, but maybe having someone out in the middle who can bring a bit of light-heartedness to proceedings during a pressure game at Lord’s is no bad thing.
Someone who doesn’t do much laughing is Marizanne Kapp, whose 77-run partnership with Meg Lanning from 48 balls gave Invincibles hope in a mammoth run-chase. As Syd’s graph shows, the highest-grossing phase of the match for either side was actually Invincibles’ late-middle phase:
This was the point at which Lanning and Kapp were really taking off, as they strategically targeted the shorter boundaries on the Grand Stand side of the ground. “We didn’t talk numbers at all. It was literally about where our boundaries were, and what pockets we were going to target. It was pretty difficult with the slope and the wind and the bigger boundaries, you had to only hit to one side of the ground,” Lanning said afterwards.
But Invincibles had been too slow to get going – Lanning started with 12* off 17 – and it was that slow start which cost them this opening match of the 2025 Women’s Hundred. A lesson, perhaps, as they look to their next match on Saturday at The Oval.
CRICKETher 