Month: April 2026

ONE DAY CUP: Surrey v Durham – Filer’s Flurry in Surrey

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Rumour has it* that Charlotte Edwards was at The Oval today (Ed: is she following us around?) although she didn’t actually prove visible to the naked eye – much like some of the balls in Lauren Filer’s opening spell.

After winning the toss under blue skies at The Oval, Durham had posted 256 for 8. A skipper’s knock of 106 from Hollie Armitage, a nifty half-century from Mady Villiers and a handy back-end cameo of 18 not out off 10 balls from Sophia Turner all played a role.

But it looked to be well light of a competitive total on a belter of a wicket at The Oval. That is, until Filer began her work.

Surrey v Durham at The Oval 🏏

— CRICKETher (@crickether.com) 2026-04-18T13:09:01.389Z

It’s a bit of an open secret that Edwards has not yet settled on her World Cup Fifteen – hence pulling all the England contracted players out of the One-Day Cup earlier this week for an intra-squad camp. Some big decisions lie ahead, including what is likely to be a three-way fight for one spot in the World Cup squad between Filer, Issy Wong and Em Arlott.

Over in Chelmsford, Wong (0-21 off 4 overs) was being pummelled by Grace Scrivens, while Arlott (2-14 off 5) was economical but unspectacular.

Meanwhile here in Surrey, Durham’s powerplay bowling exactly epitomised Edwards’s dilemma: go with the safe option of Arlott, or throw caution to the winds and opt for the ferocity of Filer?

Filer started with an erratic no-ball beamer which hurtled over the fine leg boundary, costing a sum total of five runs. She also fell over in her follow-through three times in as many overs – a worrying habit which England confidently claimed last year that they had cured her of.

“The first couple of overs was a bit of a pick and mix,” Filer said afterwards. “I said to Hollie [Armitage], ‘I’m sorry mate, I’ve probably not bowled as straight as I can’ – but the balls that did go straight were wickets. So it was just taking the confidence from those balls into future overs.”

She blamed her falls on “a big divot in the foot holes” and joked: “It’s not Lauren Filer if I don’t fall over.”

In fact, the Surrey top-order looked genuinely frightened of her pace: a fear which translated into figures of 3 for 13 in her first three overs. Paige Scholfield and Alice Davidson-Richards both had their middle stumps pegged back; in between, Alice Capsey was hurried into a drive and got an edge behind – albeit reliant on a fantastic diving catch from Tahlia Wilson to pouch it.

Just how quick was Filer bowling in the powerplay? There was no speed gun in operation, but Filer reckoned: “There were a few balls that were pretty up there.” (A reminder that for Filer, that means high 70s – she’s apparently been clocked at 80mph in training.)

Kira Chathli fought fire with fire, pulling and crunching Filer’s next over for 14 runs. But when the England quick returned for a second spell, Armitage tapped Filer on the shoulder and indicated that she should put in a deep square leg. Sure enough, Chathli sent one down her throat, handing Filer a fourth wicket and Armitage some field-placement bragging rights.

Filer often only looks dangerous when fresh, so perhaps the most interesting part of today was that her third spell (which consisted of two overs, the 29th and 30th) proved almost as threatening as her first. She basically bounced out the 19-year-old Jemima Spence, who tried to keep her body out of the way while waving her bat around, and was bowled.

The upshot of it all was that Filer finished with 5-59 – a List A best.

Of course, a typically aggressive innings from Danni Wyatt-Hodge eventually saw Surrey win by 3 wickets, picking up a bonus point in the process. But if Filer earns selection in a home World Cup on the back of today, maybe she’s the real winner?

The question, as ever, is whether the guaranteed risk is worth the possible reward. Only one woman knows the answer – and for now, she is keeping her counsel.

*Later confirmed by Filer after the match.

ONE DAY CUP: Hampshire v Essex – Young Guns (Go for It!)

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Worries about the future of England’s batting may not have entirely been put to rest on a blustery opening day of the season at the Hampshire Bowl – no one at Southampton came close to matching the 124 off 80 balls scored by 34-year-old Danni Wyatt-Hodge for Surrey v Warwickshire, 150 miles to the north in Edgbaston. But between them, Young Guns Ella McCaughan (aged 23), Abi Norgrove (20), Jodi Grewcock (21) and Freya Kemp (20) scored over 300 runs, with Hampshire emerging blinking into the daylight of a new summer, surpassing Essex’s 265 with just two balls to spare.

With Georgia Adams niggled in the quads, it was Naomi Dattani who led out a Hampshire side that contained one young debutante – 21-year-old Cesca Sweet – and one slightly older one, in the now fully evolved form of 28-year-old Pokemon connoisseur par excellence Amanda-Jade Wellington.

They quickly reduced Essex to 21-2 – Grace Scrivens caught at slip for a duck and Cordelia Griffith run out by inches via a direct hit from Dattani – but Grewcock and Lissy MacLeod set in for a 94 run partnership. By the time MacLeod was run out attempting a sharp single just a little too casually, beaten by a sharp throw from Bex Tyson, Essex had reached 115, while Grewcock went on to make 80 off 97 balls, before being bowled trying to pull a straight one from Dattani.

There was a slight sense of disappointment that Grewcock hadn’t pushed on to 3 figures; but the platform she had established nonetheless allowed Essex to close in on a final total of 265-8. Some slightly frantic work from Sophia Smale (33 off 29) and Kate Coppack (17 off 17), combined with some woeful fielding from Hampshire including 3 drops that you’d expect to be taken 999 times out of 100 at this level, allowed Essex to add 70 runs in the final 10 overs – finishing at almost exactly an “average” first innings score for this competition – 266 being the typical first dig in 2025.

With England coach Charlotte Edwards In Da House (keeping a low profile in the upper part of the pavilion) a couple of fringe players would have been keen to impress, but possibly none more so than Maia Bouchier, looking to bat her way back into England contention after being dropped last summer. Edwards has always been a fan of Bouch, having brought her to Hampshire back in the “old” county era; but whilst her talent has never been in doubt, her concentration remains an issue, and so it was today as she looked to the heavens having popped the simplest of catches up to Jo Gardner at extra cover for 7.

If Edwards really is setting store by county form, then the return of Ella McCaughan, playing her first match since injury brought a premature end to her promising 2025 season, will have given her much more to think about. McCaughan (90) and Norgrove (85) put on 147 for Hampshire’s second wicket, as they milked a decidedly average Essex attack, to keep the hosts in touch. It wasn’t the stuff for which adjectives were made, but it did a job and by the 35-over mark had taken Hampshire to 167-1 with the target now in sight, albeit with the required rate drifting towards 7s.

It needed something more, and that something came in the form of Freya Kemp, who entered the fray after Sophia Smale had McCaughan caught and bowled 10 short of her century. Kemp didn’t bring out the fireworks; but she smartly worked the spaces in the field to register a surprisingly risk-free run-a-ball 46 which turned the game decisively in Hampshire’s direction. Kemp couldn’t quite finish things off, caught in the deep by Gardner in the penultimate over; but Naomi Dattani could, striking the winning runs with a couple of balls in the bag, to get Hampshire up and running in 2026.

EXCLUSIVE: Heather Knight to Captain London Spirit Via AI Persona

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In a ground-breaking development, London Spirit have announced that Heather Knight will continue to lead the team in 2026, via an AI Persona trained on the captaincy decisions she took in her ten years at the helm of England.

Ball-by-ball info from NV Play has been fed into the project, detailing every bowling change and key fielding positions, including cover and deep extra cover.

Despite Knight herself not taking the field in 2026, having been elevated to the position of General Manager, the captaincy choices she would have made will be relayed to an on-field deputy via the intriguingly named “Project Gaslight” which beams subliminal instructions to the on-field skipper directly from The Cloud.

This is understood to get around the ICC’s ban on the use of on-field communications devices because there is no actual “communication device” – merely a beam of information directly from a server, based for legal reasons in Azerbaijan.

Jon Lewis, Head Coach of London Spirit, said:

“Heather is probably the most brilliant captain the world has ever known. Having myself pioneered the use of AI in selection during the Women’s Ashes triumph of 2023, when I led England to an unprecedented moral victory by drawing the series 8-all, I knew immediately that this was the answer to all my problems.”

“I was inspired and entertained by the opportunity to work with this system, and I’m sure the fans will be too.”

The technology was developed by the Tech Titans Group, led by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who purchased London Spirit for £145m last summer.

Dr April Fulio, head of the Advanced AI Lab at the University of George Washington State in Seattle, said:

“Project Gaslight is bleeding-edge tech; but we’re hoping that the bleeding will be fixed in time for the opening match at Lord’s in August.”