Heather Knight reflects on winning start as England Women's captain

Heather Knight could hardly have asked for a better start to life as England Women's captain.

England have won each of their six games under her leadership thus far, dominating both the ODI and T20I series with Pakistan Women.

While greater challenges await Knight and her team, the results have certainly taken the pressure off after the uncertainty surrounding the side following Charlotte Edwards' retirement.

We caught up with the new England skipper to get her take on her first month in the role…

On the Pakistan series…

It's been good fun. I don't think it could have gone any better looking back at the last six games. The girls have responded to everything we've asked of them and the extra responsibility a lot of the batters have taken on as well. It's been a really enjoyable time and it's given us a really good base to kick on from and have a really good winter as well.

On replacing Edwards…

Obviously, Lot was captain throughout my England career and I think the main thing I took from her captaincy is how she looked after her game and led from the front in scoring runs, as well as her passion for the game - her passion never wavered.

She was always the first one in the nets and driving the team forward that way. There are loads of things I'll take from Lot and I can still get advice from her now, even though now she is on the other side in the commentary box.

Whoever took over from Lot, it was always going to be difficult to follow her because she has been so successful and led the team for 10 years. It felt like quite a fresh start and it gave me a chance to stamp my mark.

The changes that were made meant there was always going to be pressure on the team but I think after the first game, we got a good win in and it was uphill from there. I'll try and do the job my way, in the best way I can. I'm not going to try and be someone I'm not and I'm sure the girls wouldn't want me to do that either.

On her first game as captain…

It was obviously on the reserve day so there was a lot of waiting around before I could lead the team out for the first time. It was a perfect start [taking 5-26 and scoring 50no] and nice for the girls to get off with a win. From 30-2, chasing what I guess was a modest total, it could have been completely different.

We were probably under the most pressure going into that game with questions over the batting line-up and who was going to score the runs. It was nice to get us over the line with the bat and pick up a few wickets as well, it took the pressure off me quite early and let me relax into the role.

On Tammy Beaumont and Lauren Winfield…

They've been outstanding. That's probably the biggest positive we'll take, Tammy and Lauren's opening partnership. It's great to see them scoring runs, they've worked really hard leading up to the series having not shown their talent consistently on the international stage previously.

They're both really natural strikers of the ball and it's been about getting to go out and do that at the top of the order and have the belief that they belong at international level. It's great to see them being greedy as well when they're in that great form, they never get bored of scoring runs.

As a batting line-up, they've set us up really well in these series. The partnership at Worcester, in particular, was outstanding and it let the rest of the batters come in, let loose and obviously get that highest ODI total, which was really pleasing.

We've played really good cricket and been really skilful in playing the type of entertaining cricket that people want to come and watch.

On new faces in the squad…

The series gave us an opportunity to blood a few new players and give them a bit of international exposure. It's always really nice when a young player comes into the group because you see how excited they are and it's a little reminder of how special it is to play for England.

Sophie Ecclestone and Alex Hartley have come in and been really impressive, had a lot of energy around the group and done pretty on the pitch as well. They're certainly two for the future in terms of left-arm spin.

On the future…

We haven't been looking too far ahead but we have a big six months coming up. We're off to the West Indies in October and that'll be a big test for us, they're in good form at the moment. Away from home that'll be an important series.

At the moment, it's building series by series, developing these girls and continuing to play the cricket we have done - and doing that consistently.

Obviously, there's a World Cup in England next year, that'll be a big opportunity for us, having a home World Cup and it'll be massively exciting to see what this team can do. Hopefully with lots of one-day cricket in the next few months we can really focus on that and build towards the World Cup.

On Women's Cricket Week…

Women's Cricket Week has been really nice. Sky have been brilliant and done lots of features, not just on the top of the game but the women's game all the way through and I think that's massively important. We just wanted to play our part with our cricket on the pitch and win the three games during the week.