ST JOHN’S, An­tigua – Crick­et West In­dies (CWI) has an­nounced the 15-mem­ber squad for the up­com­ing white-ball home se­ries against South Africa Women, set to take place at the icon­ic 3Ws Oval in Bar­ba­dos. The se­ries, sched­uled for Wednes­day (June 11) to June 23, will fea­ture three One-Day In­ter­na­tion­als (ODIs) and three T20 In­ter­na­tion­als (T20Is).

The Ma­roon War­riors re­turn to the Caribbean af­ter a dif­fi­cult tour of Eng­land, where they were un­able to se­cure a win in the six-match ODI and T20I se­ries. Now back on home soil, the team is fo­cused on re­group­ing, re­set­ting, and reignit­ing their cam­paign in more fa­mil­iar con­di­tions as they aim to de­liv­er stronger, more con­sis­tent per­for­mances on the in­ter­na­tion­al stage.

De­spite the dis­ap­point­ing re­sults in Eng­land, the West In­dies Women showed glimpses of their po­ten­tial es­pe­cial­ly from in­ter­na­tion­al debu­tants Jahzara Clax­ton, the first woman from St Kitts to play in­ter­na­tion­al crick­et, and Guyana's Realean­na Grim­mond, who scored a half-cen­tu­ry on her ODI de­but. Cap­tain Hay­ley Matthews emerged as the stand­out per­former with 177 runs and three wick­ets in the T20I se­ries and was du­ly named "Play­er of the Se­ries".

The Pro­teas Women ar­rive in the Caribbean ranked high­er than the West In­dies in both for­mats, with South Africa po­si­tioned fifth in both ODI and T20I rank­ings while the Ma­roon War­riors are ranked ninth in the for­mer and fifth in the short­est for­mat.

Matthews will once again lead the squad, which sees one change from the Eng­land tour, with ex­pe­ri­enced all-rounder Chinelle Hen­ry com­ing in for Cher­ry-Ann Fras­er.

Miles Bas­combe, CWI Di­rec­tor of Crick­et, ex­pressed con­fi­dence in the team’s abil­i­ty to bounce back:

“Af­ter a chal­leng­ing tour, this home se­ries of­fers the per­fect op­por­tu­ni­ty for the team to re­gain their foot­ing and reestab­lish their con­fi­dence play­ing in fa­mil­iar con­di­tions and in front of West In­di­an fans. We be­lieve in this group’s tal­ent and re­silience, and we look for­ward to see­ing them play pur­pose­ful, pas­sion­ate crick­et.”

Head coach Shane Deitz echoed the im­por­tance of the up­com­ing match­es, say­ing: “Ob­vi­ous­ly, Eng­land's re­sults didn't go how we want­ed, but it was a great learn­ing op­por­tu­ni­ty and a chance to bring some young play­ers in­to our team and give them their first taste of in­ter­na­tion­al crick­et.

"We had five play­ers aged 21 and un­der in our last ODI against Eng­land, so it was great to see a young team go out there and mix it up with one of the best teams in the world. All those younger play­ers learned some valu­able lessons dur­ing that se­ries which we hope they will bring in­to this se­ries to con­tribute some more for the team and put in some match-win­ning per­for­mances.

“It's great that Hay­ley is now avail­able for this se­ries - her home se­ries in her home­town and she'll be re­al­ly ex­cit­ed to put on a great show in front of her fam­i­ly, friends and sup­port­ers of West In­dies crick­et. It’s al­so great to wel­come back Chinelle Hen­ry. In the last 12 months she has been a world class play­er, so it's great to have her back in the team, on and off the field.

“This is go­ing to be won­der­ful se­ries and a great op­por­tu­ni­ty for our girls to test their skills and abil­i­ties against one of the best teams in the world, so I am look­ing for­ward to get­ting out there putting on a great show for our West In­dies sup­port­ers. We can't wait to hear and feel their sup­port when we go out to play on Wednes­day.”

The team ar­rived in Bar­ba­dos on Sun­day (June 8) ahead of the first ODI on We­nes­day (June 11).

The sec­ond T20I on June 22, will be par­tic­u­lar­ly spe­cial as it co­in­cides with the pres­ti­gious CWI and West In­dies Play­ers' As­so­ci­a­tion (WIPA) Awards cer­e­mo­ny, cel­e­brat­ing the achieve­ments of Caribbean crick­et stars across both men's and women's crick­et.

Ad­mis­sion to the games is free and all match­es will be broad­cast live across the Caribbean and in­ter­na­tion­al­ly on ES­PN Caribbean.

West In­dies Women’s Squad vs South Africa

Hay­ley Matthews (cap­tain), She­maine Camp­belle (vice-cap­tain), Aaliyah Al­leyne, Jahzara Clax­ton, Afy Fletch­er, Shak­i­ba Gajn­abi, Jan­nil­lea Glas­gow, Realean­na Grim­mond, Chinelle Hen­ry, Zai­da James, Qiana Joseph, Mandy Man­gru, Ash­mi­ni Mu­nis­ar, Kar­ish­ma Ramharack, Stafanie Tay­lor

Team Man­age­ment Unit

Head coach: Shane Deitz

Team man­ag­er: Sheena Good­ing

As­sis­tant coach: Ryan Austin

As­sis­tant coach: Damien Wright

Team an­a­lyst: Gary Belle

Phys­io­ther­a­pist: An­gel­i­ca Hold­er

Strength & Con­di­tion­ing Coach: Hec­tor Mar­tinez Charles

Per­for­mance Coach: Dr Na­dine Sam­my

Me­dia & Con­tent Of­fi­cer: Nicholas Mait­land

Se­ries Sched­ule: (All match­es will be played at the 3W’s Oval)

1st ODI – Wednes­day (June 11), 10 am

2nd ODI – Sat­ur­day (June 14), 10 am

3rd ODI – June 17, 10 am

1st T20I – June 20, 2 pm

2nd T20I – June 22 – 10 am

3rd T20I – June 23– 2 pm