Simply phenomenal Kerr smashes long-standing world record
A world record with the bat, a quick nap, career-best bowling figures and all rinsed down with a dose of reality TV.
By any teenager’s standards, it’s pretty much the perfect day.
At just 17, White Ferns allrounder Amelia Kerr has, for a couple of years, been tagged as a potential superstar and yesterday she proved the hype is real with a record-breaking score of 232 not out in the one-day international against Ireland in Dublin. New Zealand won by 307 runs to clinch the series 3-0.
She scored more than half of New Zealand’s total of 440-3.
She became the youngest cricketer, male or female, to score a double-century in international cricket.
The record was previously held by Javed Miandad in tests when he scored a double hundred at 19 years and 140 days.
Opening the innings, Kerr blasted 31 fours and two sixes in her 145-ball knock to better Australian Belinda Clark’s 229 not out set in 1997.
And Kerr’s breakout day was not done there – even though she did need a quick nap before her career-best effort with the ball.
‘‘After my innings, I had a little nap,’’ Kerr said of her 10-minute sleep on the physio table during the lunch break.
Somehow, amongst all the excitement, Kerr managed to fall into a deep sleep.
A quick nap was understandable after Kerr carried her bat through the entire 50 overs of the White Ferns’ innings.
The nap did the trick as the leg-spinner claimed 5-17 from seven overs to help her side to a 305-run win.
So surely an early night was on the cards following the demanding but rewarding day? Not when there is reality TV to catch up on.
‘‘I will sleep well, I have to stay up until 10 o’clock to finish Love Island but then we’ll be in bed,’’ Kerr said.
Sadly for Kerr’s proud parents Robbie and Jo, they arrived in Ireland on the day of the match but missed seeing their daughter’s phenomenal performance.
Kerr wasn’t even born when Clark, a former Australian captain, belted the previous high score of 229 against Denmark in 1997, and she admitted shortly after her record-breaking effort that she had never even heard of Clark.
‘‘It’s pretty surreal,’’ Kerr said. The young leg-spinner said that her body was hurting a bit but given the success of the day, she was happy to embrace the pain.
As she continued to plunder boundaries late in her innings, the Wellington all-rounder was blissfully unaware of the history she was creating.
‘‘I had no idea. I think I heard them say stuff on the speaker but I didn’t hear them because everyone was clapping,’’ Kerr said.
Her previous best score in any form of cricket was 152 for Wellington against Otago in an under-21 match.
When Kerr reached her century she had no plans of giving her wicket away. Despite her lack of experience at international level, Kerr had a solid plan in the middle.
‘‘Put the bad ball away but keep scoring off most balls and then I knew the power play was coming soon.
‘‘Once we got to the power play with only three out I was going to try and go hard then,’’ Kerr said.
It wasn’t all plain sailing early in Kerr’s innings.
‘‘I had to work hard at the start but then once I got through I got going a bit,’’ Kerr said.
She said her partnership with Leigh Kasperek – the second highest in ODI history – enabled her to bat with aggression because they were not losing wickets.
The pair put on 285 runs for the second wicket in a partnership that lasted 33 overs.
When she did return to the middle for the second innings, Kerr was expecting White Ferns captain Suzie Bates to go easy on her.
‘‘I didn’t think I was actually going to bowl today. I thought Suzie was just going to let me have a rest in the field standing at slip all day,’’ she said.
But Kerr soon became thankful for the opportunity as she spun her way to career-best figures.
‘‘The pitch was turning which obviously helps me,’’ she said.
In April this year, Wellington Blaze head coach Christie van Dyk told Stuff Kerr was ‘‘probably the most gifted cricket player that I’ve come across in my 27 years of coaching, especially in the women’s game’’.
‘‘She will probably be, for the White Ferns and for the Blaze, the best all-rounder that’s played the game if she continues the way she is now,’’ van Dyk said.
‘‘I think I heard them say stuff on the speaker but I didn’t hear them because everyone was clapping.’’
Amelia Kerr, right