Women’s international cricket is slowly and steadily gaining momentum after almost a year-long forced break due to COVID-19. The latest news comes from Europe where Germany will be hosting France for a five-match T20I series in July.
This will be the first time these two nations will play each other in an official WT20I. Before this, Germany toured Austria in August last year for a five-match T20I series in which Germany comprehensively whitewashed Austria 5-0. Germany will be looking to pick up from where they left and strive to put up a tough contest for France.
This series is important for both sides as it will offer match practice and game time to them for the upcoming ICC Women’s T20 World Cup Europe Qualifier, which is scheduled to take place towards the end of August.
The Deutscher Cricket Bund (DCB) made the announcement on Twitter that the series would be hosted at the new national performance center in Krefeld. The Krefeld center has allowed Germany to greatly expand its home fixture offering this year.
We are happy to announce a five match T20i series between our women’s national team and @francecricket in July at our national performance centre in Krefeld as a warm up to the ICC World Cup Qualifiers in Scotland in August @GoldenEagles_DE pic.twitter.com/Vs3b7XEedy
— Cricket Germany (@Cricket_Germany) March 2, 2021
The series is expected to be a well-fought one as Germany and France are ranked 25th and 30th respectively in the WT20I rankings. Out of the two sides, France will be especially eager for the preparation before their path to the 2023 Women’s T20 World Cup starts in Scotland on August 26th.
The European qualifier for the ICC Women’s World T20 also features Ireland, Scotland, Netherlands, and Turkey. The European qualifier will be France Women’s first appearance at an ICC event. Germany will also look to make the most of the series and prepare themselves for tougher challenges that come in the form of established teams like Scotland and the Netherlands. The two sides had beaten Germany comfortably at the 2019 European Women’s World T20 Qualifier.
The series brings excitement for the players as well as the fans. The fans will be hoping that the Germany-France series receives similar coverage as the Germany-Austria series that was played last year. The European Cricket Network (ECN) streamed every match of that series live. The streams garnered encouraging viewing numbers and therefore there is a strong chance of ECN coverage in July.
The details pertaining to possible live streams, as well as exact fixture dates, will be revealed closer to the series start.
The article was first published on Emerging Cricket
I am a former cricketer having represented Mumbai University at All India University level. I was a part of MCA probables for the U-19 and U-23 age group. I have been an avid cricket writer for the last five years. Currently I am pursuing my Ph.D from IIT Bombay.