‘The best female cricketer ever’
England’s most decorated captain Charlotte Edwards already rates Australian Ellyse Perry as the best women’s cricketer of all time, but expects her to set the bar even higher in the coming years.
Edwards, generally regarded as her country’s best-ever player, 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 Perry’s career is doing anything but dipping.
In the most unsurprising 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-taker of the series with 15 wickets at under 13.
‘‘I loved playing against her and she’s improved a lot since I stopped playing,’’ Edwards said.
‘‘You knew then she’d become an unbelievable batter. She was mainly a bowler and now we see what an unbelievable all-rounder 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 ‘‘Godgiven 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,’’ Edwards 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.’’
If there was a minuscule chink in her armour previously, it was her scoring rate in Twenty20 cricket, 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.