Women’s tour hit by Covid scare

THE WOMEN’S Ashes yesterday came under threat before they have begun when a member of England’s support staff at their Canberra base tested positive for Covid. Captain Heather Knight admitted to ‘anxiety and nerves’ over the future of the multi-format series due to begin with the first Twenty20 international on Thursday. Now England will undergo further rounds of testing before they can move on to Adelaide by charter flight on Monday on a trip already hampered by strict conditions. ‘There are nerves and anxiety in the group,’ said Knight after the unnamed staff member’s positive test. ‘It’ll be a nervous 24 hours but the PCR tests we’ve done have all come back negative, so fingers crossed.’ The England squad spent much of Christmas and the new year in virtual isolation to ensure they could make the trip. ‘People put in a colossal effort just to get out here,’ said Knight. ‘We could only train at home so we’ve had mums feeding bowling machines and dads batting against our bowling. It’s been pretty comical and not ideal for a series of this magnitude.’