Australia’s women begin a three-match series against New Zealand in Queensland on Thursday having not played an international since April
Phoebe Litchfield hopes to find a spot in Australia’s middle-order • Getty Images
Three-time defending women’s T20 World Cup champions Australia are hoping to shake out the rust and do some heat acclimation ahead next month’s tournament in the UAE in their warm-up series against New Zealand starting on Thursday in Mackay.
Australia’s women have had a rare lengthy break between international assignments having not played since the limited overs tour of Bangladesh in March and April.
Several of Australia’s squad played in the women’s Hundred in the UK in August while Tahlia McGrath was only one of Australia’s 15-strong squad to play in recent Australia A limited-overs series against India A.
Australia is one of the few teams that hasn’t played international cricket recent months as Pakistan and South Africa have squared off while England and Ireland have locked horns. Australia’s opponents New Zealand had a lengthy tour of the England in June and July.
Phoebe Litchfield, who played in the Hundred for the Northern Superchargers, believes there shouldn’t be too much rust amongst the defending champions given most have been playing somewhere over the winter months. But she did note that the team needed to do some heat acclimatisation before the trip to the UAE.
“It’s going to be hot. Not too dissimilar to Bangladesh,” Litchfield said on Tuesday. “So our preparation continues the same, and we’re probably going to do some heat acclimation over the next sort of week and a half to get ready. But I think being Australian, we’re really suited to hot weather, so hopefully it won’t be too bad.”
Litchfield said the squad was disappointed the tournament had to be moved from Bangladesh for security reasons, particularly after Australia had learned quite a lot about the conditions in Bangladesh from their tour there earlier in the year.
“I think it’s really disappointing not to go to Bangladesh,” Litchfield said. “I know how much they were looking forward to it. But I think Dubai offers as much as it can, and we’re looking forward to it. I was having a look at a few temperatures there. It’s going to be 37 [degrees Celsius] feels like 45 kind of thing.”
Litchfield, 21, has not played in a World Cup. Despite making her international debut just prior to the 2023 World Cup in South Africa Litchfield was not part of the squad that went onto win the title.
She had an extended run in the side last summer in the middle order and performed superbly at times, particularly against West Indies in the first series of the season. But she only played two of the three T20Is in Bangladesh. She did not get a bat in the first game and then opened in game two when Australia completely changed the order to give some of their players a hit, before being left out of game three.
Litchfield was unsure whether she was a guaranteed starter for the upcoming series against New Zealand and the World Cup but believes she will probably bat in the middle order again.
“I assume it’s probably going to be similar to what I’ve been doing before, if I do play,” Litchfield said. “It’ll be going through the middle order and hopefully building off the back of some top order brilliance.”
Both Australia and New Zealand arrived in Mackay on Monday with the first two matches of the series to be played on Thursday and Sunday before the teams move to Brisbane for the final game next Tuesday. Both squads will fly straight to the UAE next Wednesday.
Alex Malcolm is an associate editor at ESPNcricinfo
