Perry ‘greatest’ player
Rival sings praises after Ashes series
ENGLAND’S most-decorated captain Charlotte Edwards already rates Ellyse Perry as the best women’s cricketer yet, but expects her to set the bar even higher in the coming years.
Generally regarded as her country’s best player so far, Edwards first played against a 17-year-old Perry in 2008 when she was very much a bowler who batted.
Fast-forward 11 years and the trajectory of her career is doing anything but dipping.
In the least surprising of decisions, Perry was voted the player of the women’s Ashes series after finishing as the leading scorer with 378 runs at a Bradmanesque average of 94.50, and at the top of the leading wicket-takers with 15 wickets at under 13.
“I loved playing against her and she’s definitely improved a lot since I stopped playing,” Edwards said.
“You knew then she’d become an unbelievable batter, she was mainly a bowler in my career and now we see what an unbelievable allrounder she is and the greatest female player we’re ever going to see.
“In one skill alone, in terms of bowling or batting she’d be a great.
“And she’s getting better and better with age, she’s only 28, it’s quite scary really to think what she can achieve in the next few years.”
Rather than her natural “God-given athletic ability”, which England coach Mark Robinson said was a difference between her and England players, Edwards points to her ultra-competitiveness.
“One thing all the great players share is that competitiveness, the desire to want to be better,” she said.
“That just strikes me every single time I watch her warm up and she treats the last game of the series like the first game of the series.
“She wants to win and it’s something sometimes you can’t coach that. That’s something very special about her.
“She’s so competitive and hates getting out and that’s a good thing. She values her wicket but equally she knows her game very well.”
If there was a minuscule chink in her armour previously, it was her scoring rate in Twenty20, but her unbeaten 60 off 50 balls, including three sixes, shows how dangerous she can be without corrupting her natural correct technique.
Perry will be the reluctant, but deserved, spotlight of attention during the T20 World Cup on home soil in February next year when her status as one of Australia’s greatest sports figures should be consolidated.
England salvaged some measure of pride with its 17run victory in the third T20 international in Bristol.
Sophie Ecclestone and Katherine Brunt were the match-winners for England with three wickets apiece, while debutant Mady Villiers grabbed 2-20, as Australia failed to get near the 140 target despite Perry’s unbeaten 60.
Earlier, England’s Lauren Winfield (26) and Brunt (25) put on an unbeaten 55-run partnership for the sixth wicket to push their total to 5-139. With Australia losing key early wickets the visitors were always behind in their chase.