Nasser Hussain urges England women’s team to keep evolving in pursuit of Australia

Nasser Hussain, a former captain of England’s women’s team, was delighted by how they rallied to tie the recent Ashes series against Australia, but he is aware that they must keep improving if they hope to catch up to the defending ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup champions.

The multi-format Ashes, which were won by England last month in both the ODI and T20I matches played at home, were tied at eight points apiece as Australia won the series for the sixth time in a row. However, England’s loss in the one-off Test in June put a stop to the topsy-turvy series.

For Heather Knight’s team, there were a lot of encouraging signs, and Hussain has urged England to build on that performance and keep getting better before the upcoming Ashes series in Australia at the beginning of 2025.

“England have got some good young players coming through, although actually in our Ashes series, it was the senior players like Natalie Sciver-Brunt, Kate Cross and Danni Wyatt that absolutely put in performances,” Hussain said in the latest episode of The ICC Review.

“You would be a fool to say, ‘oh, that’s it. Australia are coming back to the pack’. I don’t think they are doing that. Other nations have to keep playing catch up cricket with the Australian women’s team as they’re one of the greatest sporting teams of all time,” he added.

While ace spinner Sophie Ecclestone captured 10 wickets during the one-off Test and was a consistent threat to the opposing batsman throughout the white-ball matches, Sciver-Brunt was awarded England’s Player of the Series versus Australia.

Sciver-Brunt holds the top rank for ODI hitters and all-rounders in the current ICC Women’s Player Rankings, and Ecclestone is leading the pack as the No. 1 bowler in ODI and T20I cricket.

The 55-year-old thinks Ecclestone is still improving and will only get better, and he thinks Sciver-Brunt is still relatively undervalued as a player.

Nat Sciver-Brunt is just a high-class player, a high class individual and, in big moments, even in losing big moments against Australia at the 50-over World Cup and 20-over World Cup in the final, she is smashing it everywhere.

She never knows when to give up. She has long levers. She has great awareness of the field and where to hit some of her slog sweeps over wide mid-wicket. A great all-rounder and an outstanding cricketer,” Hussain said.

“And Sophie Ecclestone has been there for England…she’s only still young. She is very accurate. Never bowls bad deliveries. In red-ball cricket, she can go past the outside edge.

In white-ball cricket, often people play for the turn. But a little bit like Rashid Khan or something, it’s actually stump to stump LBW and bowled in white-ball cricket. She brings in the stumps in white-ball cricket and she can bat as well and she is very good in the field.

She took some good catches, some very fine catches in that Ashes series. So she’s developing a little bit like Nat Sciver-Brunt into a genuine all-rounder,” she added.

The former captain nominated Alice Capsey, Sophia Dunkley and Lauren Filer as the next group of stars that can help England continue their upward trend and believes the exposure these players receive from playing in domestic competitions around the world will help accelerate the process.

“We’ve got The Hundred…here in England and it’s going to be so important for their growth and their development to keep improving. Hopefully some of them, hopefully the WPL (Women’s Premier League in India) will keep picking up some young English players to play in different conditions as well,” Hussain noted.

“I think English women’s cricket is in a very healthy place because of The Hundred. Because they’re getting that exposure to playing against some of the best players in the world. (India pair) Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur are over (in England) to play.

When you’re playing against the best all the time, you learn from them and you’re in the same dressing room as them, that’s what’s really good about these franchise tournaments, to get in the same dressing room and see how they operate and practice. I think that’d be the great benefit of franchise tournaments for some of our young women cricketers,” she added.

-IANS