Heroes – the anthem for England women’s cricket, written and performed by Laura Wright – has been released as a single and is available now for download now on all other major music stores.
Laura performed Heroes last night at the Kia Super League Launch Party in Manchester, in front of everyone who is anyone in cricket… and us!!
The evening also brought us face-to-face with the beautiful KSL trophy for the first time.
Although the Women’s County T20 Finals Day was abolished two years ago, last weekend’s results mean that we will have something close to a de-facto Finals Day at Beckenham next weekend between Warwickshire, Kent and Middlesex.
Here’s how the table looks:
| Team | Played | NRR | Points |
| Warwickshire | 5 | 0.81 | 17 |
| Kent | 5 | 0.54 | 12 |
| Berkshire | 5 | 0.12 | 12 |
| Lancashire | 6 | -0.23 | 12 |
| Middlesex | 5 | 0.32 | 10 |
| Yorkshire | 6 | -0.51 | 6 |
| Nottinghamshire | 5 | -0.41 | 5 |
| Sussex | 5 | -1.04 | 2 |
After two more wins yesterday, Warwickshire are in the driving seat – if they win either of their games, they are champions.
But if Kent and Middlesex both beat Warwickshire, the winner of their match could (see below!) be taking home the trophy instead.
The one team who could upset the party at Beckenham are Berkshire, who play Sussex and Notts at Hove.
If Berkshire beat Sussex and Notts, they can snatch the cup if either (a) Beckenham is rained off; or (b) Middlesex win both their matches and Kent beat Warwickshire. (There is a theoretical (c) too, if Kent win both their matches and Middlesex beat Warwickshire, but it would require a massive turn-around in NRR.)
Exciting times… and between us at Beckenham, and @WomensCricBlog at Hove, we’ll have full coverage for you next weekend.
England captain Heather Knight top-scored with 32 and took 3 wickets for Berkshire, but it wasn’t enough as Middlesex cruised to victory at Wokingham.
Wokingham is getting a bit of a reputation as being a difficult place to score runs – when Berkshire played Kent and Lancashire here 3 weeks ago, the highest score was just 96 – but Berkshire made it even harder for themselves as they gave Middlesex plenty of catching practice after having won the toss and elected to bat.
It started with Maia Bouchier who, after giving away 4 runs with a ghastly misfield on the deep backward point boundary, more than made up for it with a lovely diving catch to her left at mid off, to dismiss Rachel Priest for 6 off Ria Raval.
Lissy Macleod lasted just 5 balls before popping one up to Anna Nicholls at cover; and then Alex Rogers, off the mark with a beautiful cover drive for 4, soon followed, bowled by Holly Huddleston without adding to her score.
Sherisa Gumbs hung around with Knight for a short while, taking the score to 48-3 at the half-way mark, before she drove Naomi Dattani to short midwicket; and then it was Knight’s turn to head back to the pavilion, after slog-sweeping Dattani straight to Fran Wilson on the midwicket boundary. With Alex Hartley also picking up a couple of late wickets – Amanda Potgieter bowled and Emily Gerke LWB – Berkshire finished on 92-8.
With Daisy Gardner clearly still not quite herself (she bowled 1 over in the middle of the innings, going for 8) and Lauren Bell sitting this one out, Berkshire’s attack lacked any real venom, and it was not until Knight brought herself on in the 4th over that a double breakthrough was made, the England skipper bowling Naomi Dattani for 8 and Tash Miles for 10.
This brought Fran Wilson and Beth Morgan together and they simply turned on the cruise control – Wilson making 27 off 21 balls before she became Knight’s 3rd victim, only to be replaced by Maia Bouchier, who just continued where Wilson had left off – ending up on 21* off 19 balls, with Morgan also not out on 21 (off 22) as Middlesex completed the chase with more than 5 overs to spare.
Afterwards Fran Wilson told CRICKETher that the secret to success here is batting “ugly”:
“It is sometimes a tricky pitch playing here, and low scores can be difficult to chase; but the thing is not being scared to bat a bit ugly – doing all the basics well and running hard, and not being too caught up in looking great or playing flary shots.”
The result means that Warwickshire move above Berkshire to the top of the table – after their victories against Sussex and Lancashire in this round, they need just one more win from their two remaining games next weekend, against Middlesex and Kent, to seal the title.
Former Berkshire player Emma Boswell has been appointed by Oxfordshire Cricket Board as their first Director of Women & Girls Cricket.
Boswell – a retired former Royal Navy submarine officer – is currently Assistant Coach of Berkshire’s Women’s 1st XI, and has also done some work with their age group sides this year, where she is a popular figure with the girls.
Her role at Oxfordshire will be to oversee the promotion and development of Women’s cricket throughout the county. A key focus will be creating an effective pathway – from school, via club, county and Super League, to England – ensuring there are enjoyable and rewarding experiences for the players at every stage.
Boswell is also set to return to the field with Oxfordshire, who are currently 2nd in Division 3 of the Women’s County Championship, with 3 wins from 4 completed games this season.
Not surprisingly, all the plaudits have gone to the batsmen in this series against Pakistan, but we’ve also seen some lovely bowling in the T20s from England’s left-armers. Let’s take a look at a few examples.
Sophie Ecclestone to Sana Mir (2nd T20)
Sana Mir is Pakistan’s most experienced player, but seventeen-year-old Ecclestone has her for breakfast here.
Ecclestone delivers the ball from very wide of the crease, so regardless of the spin, which would normally move the ball from leg to off (right to left, as we are looking at it) this ball is heading from off to leg (left to right).
Mir’s plan is just to help it on its way by paddle-sweeping it down to fine leg – we can see she is in position with plenty of time to do this. The advantage of the paddle-sweep here is that Mir doesn’t have to worry too much about the lateral (left/ right) movement of the ball – the length of the bat has her covered.
The down-side of the paddle-sweep is that Mir has to judge the bounce perfectly, and this is where Ecclestone does her up like a kipper. This ball in fact doesn’t spin laterally at all – it is a top-spinner, so when it pitches it comes on with more bounce than Mir is expecting – she is already playing underneath it and the ball ploughs into her middle and leg stumps. Beautiful.
Tash Farrant to Nahida Khan (3rd T20)
Nahida Khan is an experienced batsman, who made her debut all the way back in 2009, but Farrant has a plan to snag her.
Although this first picture is obviously from behind the bowler’s arm, you can actually see something rather interesting – the ball, which is a slower delivery coming out of the back of Farrant’s hand. England tried a lot of these slower deliveries in the series, and they didn’t always come off, but this one is perfect.
You can see here that Nahida hasn’t picked it – because the trajectory of the ball is “normal” she thinks it is also coming on to the bat at “normal” pace, and is preparing to unleash a big shot.
But she is on to it too quickly – the ball takes a lot longer to reach her than she is expecting and by the time it does, she is horribly tucked-up as she tries to adjust – popping up a fairly straightforward catch back to the bowler. Lovely.
Alex Hartley to Bismah Maroof (3rd T20)
Bismah Maroof is Pakistan’s T20 captain and was their highest run-scorer on this tour. Meanwhile Hartley has had problems with her line to the left-handers in both the matches she has played.
Maroof is looking to assert herself against the “inexperienced” Hartley so even before the ball is bowled she has started to come aggressively down the pitch – you can see her here dancing forwards just after the moment of delivery, looking to smash it straight back down the ground.
But Hartley has spotted Maroof coming and she changes what she is going to do at the last instant – instead of a spinner, she fires in a quicker ball – forget the spin, just get it down there – and Maroof has to check her forward march!
To be fair to Maroof, she picks it and adjusts to try to push it through the leg side, but her feet aren’t in quite the right place – her bat is too late on the shot and the ball sneaks through the gate between bat and pad and she is bowled. Brilliant.
Pictures © ECB/ Sky – See YouTube Links for copyright details – Reproduced as “Fair Dealing” under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act.
“I’ve really enjoyed the captaincy,” says Heather Knight, reflecting at the end of her first series at the helm. “The girls have been outstanding and made it very easy for me, and when they’re playing like that it’s a very easy job.”
None have performed better in this series than Tammy Beaumont and Lauren Winfield – a partnership which looks set to run and run:
“Those two have deservedly cemented their spot at the top of the order for a good few tours… Their partnerships have got even better as they’ve gone along and for me that’s been a real plus-point of this tour – how ruthless they’ve been. They never got bored of scoring runs.”
But lower down the order flexibility is the key, with England trying to ensure that the right people face the right overs:
“Nat Sciver is the one person in our squad that can score fifty off 20 balls, so she is the one that we want to send in when we’ve got that platform and that opportunity.”
Hence in the 2nd and 3rd ODIs, and the 1st T20, when England already had big totals in the bank, Sciver was promoted up the order, ahead of Knight; whereas in the 1st ODI, and the 2nd and 3rd T20s, with fewer runs on the board, it was Knight who came in before Sciver.
It is a similarly innovative approach to the tactic of opening the bowling with Nat Sciver, so that Dani Hazell can bowl the last overs of the PowerPlay, as Knight explained after the 2nd T20:
“In T20 you’re sometimes trying to get one step ahead of your opponents, and do something slightly different. We feel Dani Hazell is probably our best PowerPlay bowler [but] the worst overs as a bowler – the ones most likely to go for runs – are the ones at the back end of the PowerPlay [so] we decided to open with Nat.”
Knight is obviously delighted with the series result, but though she is confident, she is not complacent about the future:
“The cricket we’ve played has been really entertaining to watch and everyone’s feeding off the success of each other. But I know we’ll have bigger challenges to come – we’ve got a big winter ahead – and the base from this is going to let us kick on.”
Asked what the hardest part of being captain has been, Knight enjoys a joke at our expense, answering:
“Being dragged to do the media and not being able to enjoy the celebrations straight away!!”
But then she continues, with more of a note of contemplation in her voice:
“There are a little bit more demands of your time, which has taken a bit of getting used to. For me it is about not thinking about cricket constantly – I found myself thinking about cricket probably a bit too much in the last few weeks, so that’s something I can probably learn a little bit better – to have that time to switch off. That will help me have more clarity when I am thinking about cricket.”
Overall though, clearly this has been a series which Knight and her team deserve to remember for all the right reasons. Referencing the media controversy over Charlotte Edwards’s retirement, Knight concludes:
“Going into the summer there was a lot of ‘noise’ going on, but I couldn’t be more proud of how the girls responded – the character they’ve shown. It’s been a really nice place to be.”
Lauren Winfield:
There were a few criticisms of the team after the World T20 – do you think you’ve answered those?
It was an important series for us, to not only win 6-0 but the way in which we’ve gone about those runs. It’s about being ruthless and playing the brand of cricket that we want to play, which is to win by big margins. So it’s not necessarily just about the wins, it’s how we’ve played that’s been most pleasing.
Is ruthlessness a personality trait?
I’m a very ambitious and driven person so it was really tough for me not going to the [T20] World Cup. But it was an opportunity to go away from the game and say: ‘Right – where am I going here? What kind of role do I want to play for England and how on earth am I going to get there?’
I was obviously aware that changes were occurring within the team and opportunities were opening up, so I worked exceptionally hard within that period and now it’s really nice to be contributing a little bit more to England wins. It’s something that I’ve not done previously as consistently as I’d like, but hopefully long may it continue.
Are you and Tammy Beaumont sick of the sight of each other?
Me and Tammy have played a lot of cricket together – we opened together at university, and we actually used to compete against each other for opening spots. But we’re growing as a partnership and learning more about each other, both on and off the field.
I think something we’ve done really well “as a group” this summer is having lots of cricket conversations away from the game – learning about how people operate under pressure and what various members of the team need from each other and at what times. It’s been a real good learning curve for us – we’ve got a better understanding of each other as a group and hopefully that’s been shown in our cricket as well.
How do you and Tammy complement each other?
We hit different areas – if you look at the game today, our wagon wheels are quite opposite, so that’s always nice as an opening partnership and it is difficult for oppositions to be setting fields and getting bowlers to try and execute plans, if you are hitting opposite areas
Also I think we both love batting – we want to be out in the middle and we want to be the ones putting our hand up. Going out there as openers, you’ve got the longest time to bat – you know when you are going to bat, and it is just about taking those opportunities.
You certainly enjoyed the PowerPlay?
That’s how I like to play my cricket – I like to be aggressive and I never want to be in a position where I feel like I’m under pressure from the bowler – I always want to try and counter that onto the bowlers. My job within this team in T20 cricket is to lay the foundation and get the team off to a good start, so that’s what I’m looking to do every time I bat.
XBox and PlayStation game developer Big Ant Studios have announced that some of the top women cricketers will be featured in the new version of Don Bradman Cricket, which is set to be released on consoles in time for Christmas.
Big Ant, who are based in Australia, have gone all-out to do things properly – working with some of the Southern Stars to get the unique motion capture right for the female players.
The previous version of the game – Don Bradman Cricket 14 – was aimed more at hardcore fans than casual gamers, but nevertheless received mainly favourable reviews, with the Daily Express, for example, commenting: “Don Bradman Cricket IS the real deal… it’s almost as if you’re playing the real thing.”
Last year, women players were added to EA’s “FIFA” football game for the first time, with all the top international teams being featured, including England and Australia.
England’s Batting
It was another impressive performance from Tammy Beaumont, though both her and Lauren Winfield rode some luck early on. I guess that the only disappointment was that the world record highest women’s international T20 score (205) looked to be within reach, but England fell just a few short with 187, as some tight death bowling kept Sciver and Knight in check at the end.
England’s Bowling
It feels churlish to criticise such a crushing victory, but England were not great with the ball, and a better side would have punished them. England seem to have been working on their slower balls in particular… and they need to keep on working on them, because they were somewhat undercooked. In the field too, England were a bit lax towards the end, albeit after the game was already de facto won.
Sophie Ecclestone
Last Sunday, we saw Ecclestone playing at Wokingham Cricket Club for Lancashire in the T20 Cup. A week later, she was taking her first international wicket for England. And it was a tidy debut – 12 dots in 24 balls, and the wicket was actually probably the worst ball she bowled, ironically.
Tash Farrant
We were surprised not to see Farrant. England obviously went for the experience of Jenny Gunn over her, but it felt like a very conservative decision, and the doctrine of youth obviously only goes so far.
Pakistan
Though they were thrashed again, Pakistan did look a different side today – brighter in the field, better with the ball, especially at the death, and more positive with the bat. Not getting bowled out was a small victory in what is turning into a tough, tough tour for them.
England coach Mark Robinson has had some interesting decisions to make in the lead-up to the T20 series against Pakistan, which begins at the County Ground in Bristol this afternoon.
The success of Tammy Beaumont, Lauren Winfield and Nat Sciver in the ODI series – who between them scored 3/4 of England’s runs* – meant that a few others hardly got a look-in. Danni Wyatt had two innings in the series, both at the death-end, scoring 12* (off just 6 balls) at Worcester and 1 (off 3) at Taunton; whilst Amy Jones’ might as well have left her bat at home – she didn’t get a single innings. Meanwhile, Fran Wilson’s contribution has been restricted to carrying drinks.
So in the name of “building for the future” it would obviously be nice for all three to get some proper time out in the middle, in what is probably England’s easiest “least challenging” (because none of them are “easy”) series of the international cycle.
But how do you do that? Do you push Winfield down the order? Now that she at last seems to have found a role? Do you drop Elwiss for Wilson? When she just scored 77 off 78 balls at Taunton?
These aren’t simple questions to answer; even before you get to the bowling!
The injury to Shrubsole has actually made things a bit easier for Robinson. Assuming he wants to play two seamers, Farrant comes in, which gets her some overs she deserves – she is a good “containing” T20 bowler, who bowls with her brain as well as her handy left arm.
But what about the spin options? After a torrid WBBL, Laura Marsh wasn’t selected for the WWT20, but her career was thrown a lifeline when she was flown to India after all, as a replacement for the injured Dani Hazell; and she seized the opportunity, and has performed (in the words of Heather Knight) “brilliantly” in the ODIs. So do England now drop her for Hazell?
And then there is Alex Hartley. She took some stick on commentary for her performance in the 3rd ODI – she lost her line bowling to the left-hander in her first spell, and [technical jargon warning…] it all went a bit squiffy for a couple of overs; but she was taken off and came back tighter and looking more like herself. Besides, Robinson’s “big thing” is that we don’t drop people after one bad performance; so do we now do just that and send Hartley back to the bench?
The phrase “Hobson’s choice” was coined for the situation where there is only one option. But what about the time when where there are too many options? Perhaps it should be termed “Robinson’s choice”?
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* Runs off the bat.
