The international cricket summer got underway yesterday with a T20 international between the England and Pakistan Women’s teams. This post looks at what happened in that match.
ENGLAND FIGHT BACK FROM ABYSMAL START
I missed the early part of the match due to a West Norfolk Autism Group commitment, so I cannot comment on the nature of the dismissals suffered by England near the start. However, I do know that at low water mark they were 11-4, not a position from which many sides have recovered in a T20I. By the time I was able to tune in Heather Knight and Amy Jones were restoring the situation (Knight made 49, Jones 37), and their good work was continued by Danielle Gibson and Sophie Ecclestone, Gibson in particular playing a superb innings to score 41* off just 21 balls. Ecclestone finished on 18*, also scored very quickly, and in the end England has 163-6 from their 20 overs. Not a mammoth total in a T20I, but more than Pakistan Women had ever successfully chased, and quite remarkable after such a dreadful start.
GLENN THE BOWLING HERO
Pakistan started brightly, but wickets began to fall too early for comfort. The slow decline of the Pakistan innings became a crash when Sarah Glenn came into the attack. Glenn took 4-12 from her four overs, a new career best in the format for her, and Pakistan were almost out of it at 89-9. The crash of wickets included a horror spell of three balls for the Pakistan skipper, in the course of which she ran her batting partner out, and then lost her own wicket to a poor shot. The tenth wicket pair did their best, but with over 70 runs needed and them being already well behind the clock it was always a matter ‘when’ and not ‘if’. They cobbled together a stand of 21, before the last wicket went down, giving England a win by 53 runs. England won comfortably in the end, but Pakistan had given them a scare or two along the way – definitively winning the Power Play overs in the England innings and arguably winning that same period of their own innings. Ultimately Knight, Jones, Gibson and Ecclestone rescued England from an awful start with the bat, and Glenn’s outstanding spell with the ball was the clincher when Pakistan batted.
PHOTOGRAPHS
I have absolutely masses of photographs to share, having been posting about the trip to Pensthorpe for the last week, while gathering many more pictures in this splendid Norfolk spring weather (as I type this I am sat outside in shorts and t-shirt, with the temperature officially 24 degrees, and a light breeze blowing, and temperatures have been hitting the low 20s consistently for some days)…