“We talk about power and scoring in different areas, manipulating the field. I learnt a lot while playing with them.” The Australian young sensation Phoebe Litchfield speaks about learning from the Indian superstars Jemimah Rodrigues and Smriti Mandhana.
The 21-year-old young sensation from Australia, Phoebe Litchfield is the next big thing, not only for Australia but also for women’s cricket. She made her international debut as a 19-year-old on 11th December 2022 in a T20I against India.
She has scored 191 runs at a sensational strike rate of 161.86 and an impressive average of 31.83 in nine innings in the T20I format. She made her ODI debut on 16th January 2023 against Pakistan. She has already scored over 600 runs (652 runs) at a strike rate of 80.59 and an impressive average of 40.75 in just 19 innings. Her tally of runs includes four half-centuries and a couple of centuries to her name so far in the format.
She has also made her debut in the red-ball format against England in June 2023. She has scored 91 runs in five innings in the red-ball format. At the age of 21, she has already played in all three formats. Courtesy of her impressive performances at the international level, she was picked up by Gujarat Giants in the 2nd edition of the Women’s Premier League (WPL) with a price of 1 Crore. However, she failed to live up to the expectations as she just scored 108 runs in eight innings for the Gujarat Giants in the 2nd edition of the tournament.
“It was disappointing on a personal note, not to be able to contribute as much as I should have, but I have tried to take the learnings. It is hard to score runs all the time and looking back, it is a blessing in disguise that I learned to deal with failures, especially in India. Hopefully, I can score some more runs in the third season.”
The Australian young sensation Phoebe Litchfield speaks about dealing and learning from the failures and improving her game.
Phoebe Litchfield is keen on making a statement in the upcoming Women’s Premier League season.#CricketTwitter pic.twitter.com/KI2CNVwCHs
— Female Cricket (@imfemalecricket) July 16, 2024
As far as franchise cricket is concerned, she has also played for Sydney Thunder in the Women’s Big Bash League, making her debut as a 16-year-old in 2019. She has played alongside Indian women’s team vice-captain Smriti Mandhana in the WBBL. She has also been a part of the Northern Superchargers in the Women’s Hundred. She was picked up by the Northern Superchargers in the 3rd edition of the Women’s Hundred in the year 2023. She played alongside India’s Jemimah Rodrigues in the competition.
“Both are amazing batters and just to talk about batting and how they go about scoring runs is beneficial. I talked to Smriti quite a bit about the left-handed approach to batting technique wise and the way you gain power. I and Jemimah are small in stature, and we talk about power and scoring in different areas, manipulating the field. I learnt a lot while playing with them.” Phoebe Litchfield speaks about her conversations and learnings from the mainstays of the Indian batting unit, Smriti Mandhana and Jemimah Rodrigues.
Apart from the Indian vice-captain Smriti Mandhana, she also admires the former Men in Blue skipper Virat Kohli and the upcoming sensation, the 22-year swashbuckling left-handed opening batter Yashasvi Jaiswal.
The Australian women’s team led by skipper Alyssa Healy were last involved in an away white-ball series against Bangladesh. Australia whitewashed the home side in both the three-match ODI series followed by a three-match T20I series in March-April earlier this year. “The team is trending in a really good space. We just had a few practice weeks in Brisbane. Everyone seems to be hitting the ball really well, and we are in a really good place as a team. So, I think we are definitely in a position to lift that trophy again for sure.” Phoebe Litchfield speaks about Australia’s preparedness ahead of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup.
We are just a couple of months away from the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2024. The tournament will be hosted by Bangladesh. The tournament will get underway from 3rd October 2024 and will conclude on 20th October 2024. The 21-year-old left-handed batter Phoebe Litchfield will play a crucial role at the top of the order for Australia in the upcoming ICC Women’s T20 World Cup in Bangladesh, especially considering the amount of experience she has playing in the similar conditions in India.
(Quotes sourced from India Today)
