Women's Ashes: 'must-win' Test for England at Canterbury
Sunday 9 August 2015 15:19, UK
England Women’s Test clash against Australia is a must-win game if Charlotte Edwards’ side is to retain the Ashes, says Alison Mitchell.
The tourists go into the match at Canterbury with a 4-2 lead after winning two of the three one-day international matches that kicked off the multi-format series.
Live Women's Ashes
England Women took the opening two points on offer with a four-wicket win in Taunton but now trail after suffering defeats by 63 runs and 89 runs at Bristol and Worcester respectively.
Looking ahead to the Test, which starts on Tuesday and is worth four points to the winners, sports broadcast journalist Mitchell told Cricket Writers on TV that England Women can’t afford to slip up.
“England started off amazingly strongly at Taunton and put in a fantastic fielding display and an exciting run chase but they couldn’t quite hit those heights in the next two one-dayers,” she said.
“They were particularly disappointed with the way that they lost the third match at Worcester.
“It means that they go into the Test match trailing 4-2 on points; the Test match is only worth four points this year as opposed to the six that it has been previously.
“It’s a match that I feel is a must-win for England. I think it will be very difficult for them to come back if they lose the Test. If they were to lose the Test they’d have to win each of the last three T20s to retain the Ashes.
“That change in the points came about because when the Ashes was last played in Australia, England won the Test match worth a whopping six points while Australia actually won more matches across the multi-format series as a whole.
“The Aussies looked at it and thought ‘hang on, this isn’t very fair - we’ve won more matches than you in the series and lost.
“But there was always a feeling that both England and Australia wanted to place a lot of importance on the Test match because red ball cricket doesn’t feature in the women’s game internationally apart from in the Ashes.
We all know there is still a lot to play for in this series and we have taken some big lessons from the games in Bristol and Worcester. Bring on the Kia Women's Test Match!
“A couple more countries are starting to play the odd Test - India for example, when they played England last summer. But in the context of the series, the Test is at the centre of the multi-format series with the one-dayers either side which makes the series more competitive.”
Australia Women will go into the Test on a high after their back-to-back wins, which elevated Meg Lanning’s team to the top of the women’s one-day international batting rankings.
Meanwhile player of the series Ellyse Perry climbed into the top 10 of both the ODI batting and bowling rankings after turning on the style.
“Australia have just played a warm-up match on a pitch at Beckenham, which I think was a bit of a road by all accounts and a couple of their batsmen have racked up hundreds,” said Mitchell.
“Meg Lanning is in good form, Ellyse Perry - the all-rounder - is in brilliant form with the bat; she scored 78, 48 and 67 in the three ODIs but she came in on a run of half-centuries.”
Watch live coverage of England Women against Australia Women in the Ashes Test at Canterbury live on Sky Sports Ashes from 10.30am on Tuesday.
Read more from England Women's fast bowler Kate Cross in her exclusive blog for Sky Sports. Simply click on this link.
