The Windies Women cricketers will look to end strongly today, when they play England in their final Group A match of the ICC World Cup at the Darren Sammy Cricket Ground in St. Lucia from 4 pm.
A full house is expected to show up for the class. If the Windies win they will finish the group as leaders, going into the semi-finals in Antigua. The Windies women with a 7000-strong crowd support at the ground on Friday night decimated Sri Lanka by 83 runs to claim their third straight win of the tournament. That has put them on top the standings with six points and they play England which has five. Windies and England are already through the semis, where they will face the top two teams from Group B in Australia and India.
The St. Lucians turned out in their numbers at the ground and was treated to a performance reminiscent of the halcyon days of West Indies cricket as the girls routed the Sri Lankans. There was massive celebrations at the ground and you could have felt it for the fans here, as success on the cricket field has become strange to them for a while.
Barbadian Hayley Matthews who was not having a good tournament, finally put her head down and produced a brilliant allround performance to take her team to victory. She came out with a mission to show dominance and together with opening partner Deandra Dottin slammed the Lankans all over the park in getting to 187 for five off 20 overs. Matthews counted 66 runs from 36 balls with eight fours and two sixes. She and Dottin racked up 72 runs in the powerplay, falling just one short of the best of 73 scored by Australia at this World Cup.
Their association ended at 94 runs off just 9.4 overs, as the two played a number of attractive ‘calypso’ shots that went down well with the crowd that included Prime Minister Allan Chastanet. Dottin fell one short of her half century, as he struck eight fours off 35 balls. Skipper Stephanie Taylor came in and got a piece of the action and looked good while at it, scoring 41 runs from 25 balls with four fours and two sixes. Taylor became the first Windies women’s player to reach 7,000 career runs. In making 41 she now has 7,014 runs in her amazing career (4282 in ODIs) and 2732 in T20s.
When Sri Lanka took to the crease they were stifled up front by tight bowling and this led to injudicious shots, which ultimately led to their downfall. Skipper Chamari Atapattu looked the only one up for a fight and made 44 runs off 35 balls with seven fours.
Matthews was the pick of the bowlers taking 3/16 off three overs with her off-spin, while the others also chipped in to make it a great night for Windies cricket.
History was also created on the night when the 149th ball was bowled by Windies fast bowler Shakira Selman. This was the one millionth ball bowled in the history of Women’s cricket.