There have been runs galore within the lead-up to the one and solely girls’s Ashes Test and a new-look Australian batting line-up is able to feast once more in a first-ever match at iconic Trent Bridge.
Rising star Phoebe Litchfield is about to make her Test debut on Thursday evening as retirements, absences and a reshuffle look set to offer the Ashes holders one thing totally different to throw on the residence staff.
The retirement of Rachael Haynes opened one emptiness earlier than the late withdrawal of captain Meg Lanning from the tour created one other on the high of the order.
Alyssa Healy, who will captain the staff in Lanning‘’ absence, additionally moved down the order in warm-up matches having flagged her intention to not open the batting, paving the way in which for Litchfield, 20, who has a “wide circle” of household and buddies flying to England to look at her debut.
Litchfield, who made her NSW debut as a 16-year-old, has been restricted principally to 50-over and T20 cricket, with no multi-day cricket performed within the Australian home girls‘s game.
The adjustment in warm-up matches, first an Australia A v Australia game, then a clash with England A, has required a “mindset” adjustment to prepare for her maiden outing in a baggy green.
“I think just temperament and choosing which balls to score off, play the long game,” Litchfield said of the shift she had to make from so much white-ball cricket.
“There’s lot of time on this format, so taking part in sensible cricket for lengthy intervals of time.
“You’ve bought to have a superb method, however in case you drive balls that aren’t there, it’s harmful, so I believe it’s nearly taking part in sensible pictures. It’s a thoughts sport I believe I’ve realised.”
Runs haven’t been a problem for the Australians within the lead-in video games, with Beth Mooney and Annabel Sutherland making centuries. Litchfield additionally made 78 in a 167-run stand with Sutherland.
All-rounder Jess Jonassen additionally smashed an enormous 174 in opposition to a full-strength England assault, her haul approaching a dry, lifeless wicket on which England’s personal stars went large and scored a mammoth complete of 650.
It’s that type of wicket Jonassen expects when the match begins at Trent Bridge, a venue the place the Aussie girls have solely performed as soon as, a sole ODI in 1976.
The solely girls’s Test on the Nottingham floor was in 1979 and it hasn’t hosted a girls’s worldwide since 2009.
England’s males’s captain Ben Stokes ordered quick and flat pitches for his staff and Jonassen mentioned it appeared just like the directions had flowed to all different grounds as properly.
“It’ll be interesting to see what the wickets are like when we have our first training session at Trent Bridge, but I’m not really expecting them to be too much different from what we’ve got (so far),” she mentioned.
“If the men’s Ashes and all that is anything to go by, they might be a bit batting friendly.”
The Ashes consists of 1 Test, then three ODIs and three T20s, with matches at Edgbaston, Lord’s and The Oval.
Source: www.news.com.au
