White Ferns Women's World T20 Preview
Who's gonna score more runs, Suzie Bates or Rohit Sharma?
The World T20 will offer plenty of intrigue, especially as it adds a bit of national pride to the mercenary nature of T20 cricket but enhancing the overall package is the Women's World T20 which will go down at the same time. Also hosted by India, the Women's World T20 (WWT20) features 10 of the best female cricketing nations and our White Ferns will feature in Group A along with Australia, Ireland, South Africa and Sri Lanka.
While we saw Australia on our shores recently where they lost 2-1 to the Ferns, it's hard to really gauge the strength of the other women's teams. The BLACKCAPS could perform at their best and still lose group games to India, Pakistan and Australia, the mystery surrounding the Ferns' opponents and their strong showing against Australia suggests that if the Ferns are at their best, they'll be tough to beat.
Suzie Bates (capt), Erin Bermingham, Sophie Devine (vice-capt), Leigh Kasperek, Felicity Leydon-Davis, Katey Martin, Sara McGlashan, Thamsyn Newton, Morna Nielsen, Katie Perkins, Anna Peterson, Rachel Priest, Hannah Rowe, Amy Satterthwaite, Lea Tahuhu
As you'd expect, it's a very strong squad for the Ferns named by coach Haidee Tiffen. Seam bowler Felicity Leydon-Davis is the only real notable inclusion for the WWT20 after the series against Australia, she joins a strong seam attack that includes Lea Tahuhu, Thamsyn Newton, Sophie Devine and the amazing Suzie Bates. Tahuhu took a wicket in either of here T20I appearances against Australia to go with 3/34, 1/35 and 0/26 in the ODIs, she'll lead the attack for the Ferns with Bates and Devine likely to offer assistance.
Just like with the men, spin will play a key role as the WWT20 is in India and the Ferns have Leigh Kasperek and Morna Nielsen to call on. Kasperek was the best bowler from either team against Australia with 7 wickets at an average of 4.71 with her off-spin and one would expect her to continue her purple patch of form where she's taken 2/37 (ODI), 4/7 and 3/26 in her past three outings. Nielsen serves up left-arm spin had a great WBBL where she finished with 18 wickets at an average of 11 and an economy rate of 5.21 which had her ranked 4th on the wicket-takers leaderboard despite only playing 10 games.
Amy Satterthwaite was also impressive in the WBBL where she took 14 wickets at 12.57 from 11 games. Expect the Ferns to roll out a strong bowling attack of Tahuhu, Devine, Bates, Satterthwaite, Kasperek and Nielsen while we could also see spinner Erin Bermingham in the mix as well. This is a luxury that the Ferns enjoy thanks to the all-round abilities of Bates, Satterthwaite and Devine who are key figures in a very strong batting line up.
As I state throughout the series against Australia, Bates is at the top of her game. She's coming off a three game T20I series where she averaged 47 at a strike-rate of 110.15 and if she can continue this form at the top of the batting line up then the Ferns will be very dangerous.
Sara McGlashan was the pick of the Ferns' batswomen in the WBBL as she averaged 30.50 from 16 games with three 50s and most importantly a strike-rate of 124.48. Satterthwaite averaged 26.44 in the WBBL from 11 games while Devine showed her hitting ability in the WBBL with a strike-rate of 123.75 over 13 games. Throw in Rachel Priest, who opened with Bates in all three T20Is against Australia and averaged 20.75 with a strike-rate of 103.31 in the WBBL and the Ferns have a very solid top order.
The Ferns rolled out a batting line up of Bates, Priest, McGlashan, Satterthwaite, Katey Martin and Kate Perkins against Australia and that's probably a safe bet as their strongest batting line up for the WWT20. My strongest team also includes Kasperek, Nielsen, Tahuhu, Devine and I'd go with another spinner in Bermingham (leggie) as conditions should suit her, otherwise there's Leydon-Davis and Thamsyn Newton ready to fire down some seamers.
I'm not overly excited about the BLACKCAPS' prospects at the World T20 but I'm very eager to see how the White Ferns go. They are coming off a series win against Australia and touched up Sri Lanka late last year as well, although India presents a different challenge and part of the entertainment will be in watching how our Ferns go about handling the change in playing conditions. Regardless of the conditions, this is a very strong White Ferns squad and we should be very excited about their chances.