NEWS
Follow UsWest Indies may have fallen short in the Women's T20 World Cup semi-final clash against New Zealand, but have unearthed many heroes. However, their head coach Shane Deitz believes a young captain like Hayley Matthews, who has led the side remarkably well, is a brilliant role model for young girls in the Caribbean.
"On and off the field, she's an unbelievable leader. She has a lot of passion for the game and developing women's cricket in the West Indies," Deitz said at the post-match press conference in Sharjah.
"Tactically she's brilliant she knows the game really well she's learned a lot playing a lot of franchise cricket and she's really ahead of a lot of players around the world I think tactically she's brilliant and just a great leader of work ethic.
"We talk about playing the Caribbean way, the West Indies way, she really buys into that and tries to have fun. Her motto's been, let's dance through this tournament. By that, she means, let's take the opposition on and put on a show, and she leads from the front in that respect, and she's so competitive. She's been a brilliant captain since I've been here, and I think moving forward, she's actually a brilliant role model for every young girl in the West Indies to want to be."
Speaking of role models, Deandra Dottin had a terrific game. She picked up four wickets with the ball, and with the bat, she made the best of a couple of chances to score 33 off 22. Dottin had been nursing a side strain injury heading into this game and had not bowled much in the tournament as well. Deitz was quick to laud the veteran's efforts.
"She couldn't bowl early in the tournament. She had a bit of a side strain, so she was unable to bowl until the last sort of week. So, and then She hadn't done a lot of practice, but she was able to come out and bowl four really good overs," Deitz, who took over as the head coach in July 2023, said.
"We thought attacking the stumps getting it on a bit was the way forward, and she bowled a fantastic spell, and it was great, as I said, she hardly had done any bowling the last few weeks, so for her to come out and bowl like that was brilliant and I think when previously she's played in a game where she hadn't bowled, and she bowled the last over to win the game, and she wants to stand up in the big pressure situations which all the great players do.
"So, I don't think if you wanted to take the ball off her, we wouldn't have got it off her today. She just wanted to bowl and take that leadership to try to get us in a good position to chase a lower score."
Deitz feels the West Indies have improved greatly since he took charge and has already set his sights on the next T20 World Cup in 2026. "When I took over, we played Australia, which was great because we got to see what the world's best are like and where we need to get to," Deitz, who played for Vanuatu until 2019, said.
"So, we used that as a measuring stick and over the last 12 months, we've been working towards how we're going to match the best teams in the world and we had to design a way or work out a way of cricket that's going to suit West Indies cricket and how we can play with our style of play which we've been trying to work on and develop a West Indies way which has been successful in men's cricket and women's cricket for a long time.
"We're just trying to get back to those roots of entertaining cricket and backing ourselves and trying to win games, not hope the other teams play bad. We want to try out and actually get on the front foot and dominate teams. So, we're at a process. It's only been a year, as I say, but we've improved a lot. And the next 2020 World Cup, T20 World Cup in 2026, I think we'll be ready to take on the world again."
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