England Women’s Cricket team moves on to 2022 with a mission to get hold of a major title- The Ashes for the first time since 2014, defend the other one- ICC Women’s World Cup and then the Commonwealth Games. The first on the list is the Ashes starting January 27. With 17 players squad along with a 12 players ‘A’ team, the English women tour Australia for a one-off test, three ODIs, and T20Is as a part of the biggest competition between the two cricketing rivals.
Heather Knight has a message for her teammates before the Ashes tournament. #Ashes #Ashes2021 pic.twitter.com/ARZ1BkfRJh
— Female Cricket (@imfemalecricket) December 18, 2021
Ahead of the competition, Heather Knight who leads the English team has encouraged her side to ‘fight fire with fire’ in order to regain the Ashes. Calling for a ‘bold’ approach against the most successful team of women’s cricket, Knight has pointed out that when the Aussies start dominating a game, they are hard to stop so having control over them from the very start till the end is quite important.
Knight said, “We’ve got to take the game to Australia, I think. Any team that has been successful against them has gone at them: meet fire with fire. The Aussies are at their best when they’re on top of you and are trying to exploit weakness.
“We have to make sure we’re trying to punch first and be aggressive towards them and try to win those battles very early because when they get on top, they’re quite hard to flip around.”
“We’ve got some players who can definitely go out there and be very successful. We have to back the players and the skills that we’ve got to go out there and execute their skills against the best team in the world,” she said.
Among the excitement for Ashes followed by the World Cup, what has created a concerning situation is the rise of the new Covid variant, Omicron. The World Cup begins just 13 days after the Ashes end so the travel between Australia and New Zealand following all the Covid Protocol is something to be looked at. However, despite admitting it to be a bit daunting, Knight has shown the courage to live in the moment without thinking much about what is next.
Further, the star all-rounder shared her support on having a five-day test instead of four days given the last four test matches of women’s cricket have ended in a draw.
Commenting on the eventful year 2022 is scheduled to be, Knight said, “You want to win trophies, create memories and be successful,” “What an opportunity. It seems to get bigger every year.”
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