The 33-year-old all-rounder Ellyse Perry from Wahroonga, Sydney, has been a stalwart across all three formats for Australia, ever since making her international debut on 22nd July 2007 in an ODI against New Zealand.
She also made her debut for the Australian national football team just two weeks after making her international debut for Australia in cricket. She represented multiple football clubs at the domestic level. She also participated in the 2011 Fifa World Cup and became the first Australian player to represent her nation at the World Cup level in both Football and Cricket.
The multi-talented superstar has not only witnessed the rise of Australian Football and Cricket from close quarters but also has played a pivotal part in the growth of both sports, cricket in particular in the country. She has represented Australia in close to 150 matches in both the white-ball formats ODIs (141 matches) and T20Is (146 matches) and 12 matches in the red-ball format for Australia. She has scored 3852 runs at a strike rate of 78 and a humongous average of 51.36 in 114 innings. Her tally of runs in the ODI format includes 34 half-centuries and a couple of centuries. Apart from her exploits with the ball, she has also picked up 162 wickets in 128 innings in the ODI format.
As far as the T20I format is concerned, she has scored 1774 runs at a strike rate of 115.79 and an impressive average of 32.25 in 90 innings. Her tally of runs included 9 half-centuries. She has also picked up 123 wickets in 132 innings with the ball in the T20I format. As far as the red-ball format is concerned, she has represented Australia in 12 matches and scored 925 runs at a strike rate of 45.63 and a humongous average of 66.07 in 21 innings. Her tally of runs includes 4 half-centuries, a couple of centuries, and a double century. She has also picked up 38 wickets with the ball in 21 innings.
The Australian women’s team is currently in India for an all-format series. The Indian team led by skipper Harmanpreet Kaur clinched a historic, maiden victory over Australia in the red-ball format. Australia bounced back and whitewashed (3-0) the home side in the ODI series. However, India bounced back with an emphatic 9-wicket victory in the 1st T20I. “India is kind of, I guess, the spiritual home of cricket in a lot of senses.” Ellyse Perry speaks about the kind of value and significance India adds to the sport. She played for the Royal Challengers Bangalore in the Inaugural edition of the Women’s Premier League (WPL). She is retained by the franchise ahead of the 2nd edition of the WPL.
The 33-year-old all-rounder is yet again set to script history by achieving no other Australian has achieved so far in the ongoing T20I series against India. She is all set to make her 300th International appearance for Australia in the 2nd T20I. “I don’t know what’s in store but if it’s meant to be down the track and I’m still around playing, I’m really open to what happens. I don’t have a set time frame for it. Either way, it doesn’t really matter, it’s just another number.” The star all-rounder Ellyse Perry speaks about not setting a time frame on her career and is open to representing Australia as long as she can and the fact that these milestones are just like another game for her.
(Quotes sourced from Royal Challengers Bangalore Press Release and Australian Associated Press)
