Australia captain Meg Lanning will take an indefinite break from the game for personal reasons.
It means Lanning, who recently led Australia to the gold medal at the Commonwealth Games to follow their T20 and ODI World Cup titles in 2020 and 2022, will miss the Hundred where she would have played for Trent Rockets. Australia’s domestic season starts in late September with the WNCL ahead of the WBBL in October.
Australia’s next series is an away T20I tour of India in mid-December ahead of hosting Pakistan next January before the T20 World Cup in South Africa.
“After a busy couple of years, I’ve made the decision to take a step back to enable me to spend time focusing on myself,” Lanning said in a statement. “I’m grateful for the support of CA and my team-mates and ask that my privacy is respected during this time.”
Cricket Australia’s head of performance, women’s cricket, Shawn Flegler said: “We’re proud of Meg for acknowledging that she needs a break and will continue to support her during this time.
“She’s been an incredible contributor to Australian cricket over the last decade, achieving remarkable feats both individually and as part of the team, and has been a brilliant role model for young kids.
“The welfare of our players is always our number one priority, and we’ll continue to work with Meg to ensure she gets the support and space she needs.”
Melbourne Stars general manager Blair Crouch said: “We’re fully supportive of Meg’s desire to have a break from cricket and we will give her all the time, support and space she needs.”
Lanning made her international debut in 2010 and was named captain as a 21-year-old in 2014. She has led the team in 171 matches across all formats with 135 victories. Since 2017 she has only missed five internationals.
In seven short words, fast bowler Megan Schutt has delivered an insight into the mindset driving Australia towards dizzying new heights.
They go into Saturday’s Commonwealth Games semi-final against New Zealand knowing they are just two wins away from setting a new benchmark for limited-overs success, as they look to add a gold medal to a glut of T20 and ODI World Cup triumphs. This is a team driven to succeed, and happy to embrace all that comes with it.
“We’re coming in as favourites, but we come in expecting to win every single game we play and have been the favorites for a lot of tournaments now, so we’re kind of used to it,” Schutt said. “It’s a tag that we’re humbled by. We are the favorites but we thrive on that.”
They also thrive on avenging missed opportunities. Cricket’s reintroduction to the Games is the 10th major limited-overs tournament for Australia since 2010, and they have won seven of the previous nine, a run that includes five T20 World Cup crowns.
But while the wins are what defines this team as one of the greatest national teams of all time, it is the losses – like the upset against the West Indies in the 2016 T20 World Cup final and the ODI World Cup semi-final loss to India in 2017 – that provide the motivation.
“There are obviously two tournaments in the past that have haunted us, and something that kind of reinvigorated our team is that 2017 loss,” Schutt said. “We do talk about that a lot, that has been a new era for us.
“Losses drive you forward and for us we want to win every single game that we play, we want to win every major championship. It’s about getting better and evolving as a team and each new tournament brings a new challenge.”
On Saturday that challenge is New Zealand, who were well below par in their loss to England in Thursday night’s final pool game.
New Zealand made just 71 off their 20 overs, a target England reeled in within 12 overs, with star duo Suzie Bates and skipper Sophie Devine both failing with the bat.
“That was un-New Zealand like,” Schutt said of the heavy defeat. “They never turn up twice like that in a row and its T20 cricket where any team can win, so we certainly are not taking them lightly.”
Saturday’s semi-final – which will be played on a traditional turf pitch at Edgbaston after hybrid surfaces were used during the preliminary rounds – is due to start at 1800 local time (Sunday 0300 AEST).
Take an inch against Australia and they’ll still win by a mile. That’s the realization other teams have come to in recent years as the depth of talent enjoyed by the reigning ODI and T20I world champions has come to bite them again and again.
In the opening match of the Women’s Ashes in January, England started brightly with an 82-run opening stand to reach 169 for 4 from their 20-over allocation. Then Alyssa Healy fell for just 7 and Australia were 26 for 1, only for Tahlia McGrath to smash an unbeaten 91 in a 144-run stand with Meg Lanning and Australia won by nine wickets. England didn’t win another match in that series, despite challenging in the drawn Test.
Against India in their opening match of the Commonwealth Games, Australia slid to 49 for 5 chasing 155 before Ashleigh Gardner and Grace Harris launched a successful rescue mission with a 51-run partnership for the sixth wicket. And when McGrath and Beth Mooney dug Australia out of trouble at 19 for 2 in their final group match to beat Pakistan by 44 runs, a key to their success was rammed home yet again – if one or two players fail, someone else inevitably steps up .
“We were in a bit of a sticky situation early,” McGrath said after the Pakistan game. “Then Moons and I both probably struggled a bit early and had to work through that. Then that sort of allowed us to have that freedom at the end and get us to what was a really good total.”
McGrath has been a revelation in T20Is, going unbeaten in four of her six innings in the format, although she said her approach wasn’t so much about valuing her wicket.
“In T20 cricket I sort of just go out there with no fear, a bit of freedom,” she said. “I get to play my shots and I know that the batters I’ve got coming in before me are world-class, that allows me to play with that freedom.
“I’ve just been lucky that I’ve had a few not-outs because it doesn’t happen very often in T20. So I’ll just ride it for as long as I can do it.”
Her partnership with Mooney has also been key, in this instance yielding 141 runs for the third wicket.
“We’re both very chill,” McGrath said. “I remember there was a game in the Gold Coast where we got caught in traffic and it was Moons and I in the car and we literally rocked up two minutes before the start of warm-up. The security guard said to us he was glad it was us two because everyone would be freaking out.
“We’ve batted a fair bit together now. I really enjoy with Moons and we both recognize when each other is struggling.”
Mooney agreed: “She’s awesome to work with. I think we’ve got a pretty good understanding of each other and each other’s games. We’re both pretty level-headed people.
“She just comes out and plays to her strengths straight away and takes some pressure off the person at the other end, so she’s a very impressive player and hopefully she can continue that form for a while yet.”
Their union against Pakistan was all the most important after Healy, the hero of Australia’s ODI World Cup triumph in April, fell for four runs, as did Lanning, the captain. In six innings since her knock of 170 in the World Cup final against England, Healy has not passed 23. But Mooney wasn’t concerned.
“She’s looking really good in the nets,” Mooney said of Healy. “Ella She’s just been a little bit unlucky. We also know that when we get into semis and finals, that she steps up and is one of the best players in the world.
“So there’s no doubt in our changeroom that she’s going to show up and do that again for us. We’re really behind her and we know that she’s got the capacity to do some serious damage against the opposition, so I’m sure she ‘ll be fine.”
With Australia having set such a high standard for themselves, Mooney warned against seeing them as “robots” in light of “a couple of low scores”.
With the ball, Australia are also in a good place. McGrath took 3 for 13 against both Pakistan and Barbados, while spinners Alana King and Jess Jonassen have been in fine form.
New Zealand are well aware of the task they face in Saturday’s second semi-final of the Commonwealth Games, scheduled to start at Edgbaston at 6pm local time, which will be 3am on Sunday in Sydney and 5am in Auckland.
Having managed just 71 for 9 in their final group game – a seven-wicket loss to England, who will play India in the other semi-final earlier on Saturday – Sophie Devine, the New Zealand captain, was keen to put their latest result behind them .
“We were well below par and it wasn’t through lack of effort or lack of planning or anything like that, I think you just get days like that,” Devine said. “It’s never nice to be a part of but we’ve got to flush it down the dunny pretty quickly and move on to something that’s actually really exciting for us, playing in a semi-final against Australia at a Commonwealth Games.”
And Devine embraced underdog status against a side New Zealand, like everyone else, knows are capable of great things.
“I think a lot of the pressure is going to be on Australia,” she said. “They’ve certainly come into this competition as favorites and hopeful of taking that gold medal whereas a lot of people didn’t think we’d maybe make the semi-finals.
“We can really take that on board and just play with a bit of freedom and take it to the Aussies. We obviously know them really well, so I think our plans are going to be pretty spot on and likewise they know us really well too It’s always just a great battle against the Australians.”
Valkerie Baynes is a general editor at ESPNcricinfo
David Warner is unlikely to play in the UAE’s inaugural International League T20 (ILT20) in January, and looks set to remain in Australia with ongoing negotiations to have him play in the Big Bash League (BBL) for the first time since 2013.
Warner, who is contracted to Cricket Australia but doesn’t hold a BBL deal, is set to be available to play franchise cricket in January 2023 after the three-match ODI series with South Africa was canceled and there was significant interest for him to play in the UAE, particularly given his IPL franchise Delhi Capitals own the Dubai Capitals franchise as well.
But ESPNcricinfo understands that a potential deal to sign Warner to the ILT20 is almost certainly off and Warner’s manager James Erskine confirmed to the Sydney Morning Herald that they were in negotiations with CA and the Australian Cricketers Association (ACA) to have Warner play in the BBL.
CA has found itself in a bind over the prospect of Australian contracted players, who are not contracted in the BBL, potentially being offered $US450,000 to play in the UAE.
The last Test of a three-match series between Australia and South Africa concludes in Sydney on January 8, 2023, with Australia’s next international commitment not until mid-February when they are due to tour India for a four-Test series. This means that Warner, Steven Smith, Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood, among other Test players, will be available to play franchise cricket in that period. CA had hoped that all would play in the BBL given it runs from December 13 to February 4, while the ILT20 is scheduled to run from January 6 to February 12.
The CA-contracted players are not obliged to play in the BBL under their contracts and Warner and Starc haven’t played since 2013 and 2014 respectively, while Smith, Cummins and Hazlewood also don’t have BBL contracts. Starc has already confirmed he won’t make himself available in order to rest while Warner is the only one publicly linked to the UAE so far, although Cummins and Hazlewood have been sought-after recruits in the IPL in recent years and would attract a lot of interest.
Australia’s high-profile T20 players like Glenn Maxwell, Marcus Stoinis, Mitchell Marsh, Matthew Wade, Adam Zampa, Aaron Finch and Tim David all have BBL deals. The big restriction for the players’ potential earnings in the BBL is the $AUD1.9 million ($US1.32 million approx.) salary cap with top contracts in the BBL for Australian players maxing out at roughly $AUD190,000 ($US132 ,000 approx.). There are significant marketing bonuses available on top of that but the total a player can earn in the BBL is still dwarfed by the top contract in the UAE for a shorter tournament.
There has been disquiet among the players about the BBL’s decision to offer $AUD340,000 ($US236,000 approx.) to top overseas players who have been nominated in the draft. A significant portion of that contract will be topped up by CA outside of the club’s salary cap. There is further disillusionment at the fact that a number of those overseas players are likely to only be available for the December portion of the BBL and will then head to the UAE to play the full ILT20 in January for nearly twice the money.
It is written into CA, Australian domestic and BBL contracts that players need “written approval” in the form of no-objection certificates (NOCs) to play in overseas leagues but it is understood that a restraint of trade argument could be mounted under Australian common law should a player wish to go down that route. That contract clause has warded off players from making any decisive moves to the UAE this year but the ILT20 has given Warner the ability to bargain with CA and command a similar sized and structured BBL contract to what the “platinum” overseas players will get this season .
There has been speculation that Chris Lynn would also require an NOC despite not being contracted to a BBL club due to an ICC player-release regulation stipulating players still need NOCs for two years after holding a contract in Australia. But ESPNcricinfo understands that it would be unenforceable as an unreasonable restraint of trade under Australian law. Shane Watson, the current ACA president, previously played in the Bangladesh Premier League in 2019-20 without an NOC having retired from the BBL earlier in the year. It is unlikely, however, that Lynn could play in both the BBL and the ILT20.
Ricky Ponting and Usman Khawaja forecasted these issues last month highlighting the potential earnings gap between the BBL and the South Africa and UAE T20 leagues for both Australian and overseas players.
All of this is taking place as CA and the ACA prepare to start negotiations in the coming months on a new long-term MoU for the players to come into effect in 2023. One of CA’s major broadcast partners Channel Seven has also filed a Federal Court action against CA to terminate their current deal that expires in 2024 over perceived quality breaches in regards to the BBL specifically.
Glenn Maxwell has revealed he was “shattered” to miss out on selection for Australia’s most recent Test against Sri Lanka in Galle, but it has only reignited his desire to play Test cricket again with a tour of India on the horizon early next year.
Maxwell was close to playing in the first Test in Galle, but Head passed a fitness test and retained his place. He was even closer to playing in the second Test when it was revealed by skipper Pat Cummins that Maxwell was in line to play at No.8 in place of Mitchell Starc if the Galle pitch was going to be a duplicate of the surface used in the firstTest.
But conditions changed significantly with a much more placid batting surface presented, and Maxwell missed out.
“I was shattered when I got told,” Maxwell said about his exclusion from the second Test. “It wasn’t that I thought they made the wrong call, I was just genuinely disappointed.
“I really wanted to play. I loved being a part of it [Test cricket]and I loved the thought of playing again.
“Even not thinking about Test cricket for a couple of years, I felt like I was ready again. I loved working with the coaches and coming up with new tactics to deal with difficult spin bowling and balls exploding.
“I’m glad Heady got through his fitness test because I’d have hated to be in because of an injury to one of your players. Unfortunately, they changed the conditions. If it was the same conditions for both Tests, I probably would have played.But they made a slightly better wicket, and the selectors made the right call.
“I tried not to get too excited or get my hopes up too much because I know, having been in that situation so many times and been on the wrong side of it, the ups and downs of selection and the 50-50 calls … but yeah, I allowed myself to get a little bit too excited.”
Maxwell also revealed that he felt a lot more love and positivity around his possible Test recall than he had done in the past, even if he did regret that his batting style wasn’t more accepted when he was around the Test team between 2014 and 2017 .
“It’s certainly nice to have support, where I feel like I probably didn’t have that in the early days of my Test career,” Maxwell said. “It was probably the other way around, where it was just like, no, you can’t have this guy in the team. So it’s sort of nice to see it change. When I came back into the side in 2017, it felt like there was a real shift of positivity coming my way, which was rare.
“For so long, whenever I played a reverse sweep, it was frowned upon and it’s become a staple of Test cricket wherever you play in the world. Everyone plays it.
“So it’s like, where was this six years ago? It would have been nice when I was playing, if people would have looked at me and gone, oh, visionary [laughs]. uzzie [Usman Khawaja] plays 300 of them, and he’s a superstar, [he] get 150 and like, [we] bow down to him.”
Maxwell is now firmly in line to play in the four-Test tour of India next year, particularly after Head’s lean tours of Pakistan and Sri Lanka where his highest score was 26 in five Tests. Head now averages just 21.30 in Asia from seven Tests and has passed 50 only eleven. Maxwell has played all seven of his Tests in Asia and averages just 26.07 there. He has also passed 50 just eleven, but he made a superb century in Ranchi on Australia’s last Test tour of India in 2017.
“Last year I had a preseason at Junction Oval, where we would use the same pitches, maybe four or five net sessions in a row and by the fifth net session they were basically India”
Glenn Maxwell on his preparations for the India tour
The balance of right and left-handers in Australia’s top seven will be important against the left-arm orthodox of Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel, and the right-arm offspin of R Ashwin.
Maxwell’s experience facing all three in India, across red and white-ball cricket, will no doubt give him an advantage from a selection standpoint. He revealed the Australia selectors have spoken to him about what specific preparation would be best for him ahead of the India tour and he stressed, as he has previously, that playing Sheffield Shield cricket on Australian pitches will not help.
“They sort of just asked what do you need to get ready and would Shield cricket make a difference? I said no, it won’t,” Maxwell said. “Because the conditions are just so different over there. It’s certainly hard to prepare for spinning tracks in Australia during our first-class games.
“I think we’re able to still get nets up in Melbourne that can spin and do some different things. Last year I had a pre-season at Junction Oval, where we would use the same pitches, maybe four or five net sessions in a row and by the fifth net session they were basically India. And it was awesome. They were the best net sessions I had. Because I was going away, I think at that stage, the next subcontinent tour, it might have been the IPL and it was awesome. It was the perfect prep, and I had no excuses, I suppose, going into the next series.”
Alex Malcolm is an Associate Editor at ESPNcricinfo
South Africa batter Mignon du Preez is returning to the WBBL after re-signing with Hobart Hurricanes.
She was the leading run-scorer for Hurricanes last season amassing 414 runs at 31.84, striking at 115 with four half-centuries. She is returning to Hurricanes alongside her close friend and former South Africa team-mate Lizelle Lee who has signed to play in Hobart after withdrawing last season. The pair had previously played together at Melbourne Stars.
Du Preez will also be reunited with Hurricanes’ new captain Elyse Villani, who is also a former Stars team-mate.
“I can’t wait to return to Australia,” du Preez said. “I love the Big Bash. It was a big decision for me to make the move to the Hurricanes last season, but I can honestly say I had such a great time both on and off the field. I got to know a lot of the girls really well, and as we got to know each other better as a team, our cricket really improved too.
“We have a lot of the same team we had last year heading into WBBL 08, plus some pretty great additions too, and knowing first-hand what players of the quality of Junior (Villani) and Lizelle (Lee) can bring to a T20 team, I think that puts us in a pretty good position.”
