Runs flowing for relaxed Healy

SOMETIMES a player needs to have a missed opportunity to know what opportunity really means.

This is the story of run-machine Alyssa Healy, who traces her stunning form surge over the past 12 months back to a far more forgettable moment when she made a duck.

Healy was promoted to open the batting much earlier in her career, only to be out without troubling the scorers and forced to watch Meg Lanning nail a century in her place.

She stewed over the blown chance to nail down the position she had always coveted, a feeling exacerbated by Lanning’s success, which made her ask, “that could have been me”. The regret became a constant burden on her mind as she spent the next few years marooned down at No.7.

But given the opportunity again leading into last year’s World Cup in the West Indies, Healy has made it her own. Since October 2018, across all three formats, Healy has smashed 17 scores of 50 and above, including three towering centuries, the most recent of which was the biggest score in the history of women’s T20 cricket.

Healy will lead the Sydney Sixers out for their WBBL opener against the Thunder tomorrow night at North Sydney Oval, as a cricketer who has freed herself from her shackles.

“I’m not worrying as much anymore. Not worrying about the results of my innings. It used to weigh on me a lot. I never cemented down a spot in the side for a long period of time,” Healy said yesterday.

“I obviously had the wicketkeeping gloves, but I just couldn’t cement a spot in the top six of the batting order. That frustrated me.

“Those opportunities back then I think if I had done the right thing then, I could have had a longer career at the top of the order.

“Now, being given that freedom and licence to go out there and express myself has really helped me.”