Healy pleased to shut game early with ball; Devine disappointed after loss

Australia and New Zealand had contrasting nights in the same game of the Women’s T20 World Cup 2024 as Australia Women overpowered the White Ferns by 60 runs on October 8 (Tuesday) to go top of the points table. 

Australian skipper Alyssa Healy was pleased with the team’s performance, especially of the bowlers who shut the game early and did not give the opposition any chance to make a comeback. 

“Shut the game early with the ball and [am] pleased with that,” Healy said in the post-match presentation.  “150 on that wicket was good enough,” she added. 

Healy agreed that they should have gotten more than 148/8, which they did at the end of the innings. She accepted the lack on the part of the batters but was mighty pleased with the bowlers.

Expressing her joy on the bowling of Megan Schutt who was once again brilliant with the ball, Healy said, “She is awesome in World Cups in particular, not easy when you got just one look at her. She set the tone first. The whole bowling group was unbelievable.”

“Annabel Sutherland, that ‘over’ changed it for us,” she added, praising the pacer for getting the wickets of Maddy Green and Izzy Gaze on consecutive deliveries. 

Sophie Devine, the New Zealand skipper, was disappointed with her team's performance, both by the batters and the bowlers. She was especially critical of the batters who let the required run rate creep up early on. 

“We needed to get a good start, we let the run-rate creep up and in games like that the run-rate can accelerate so quickly. Disappointing night, but as we said after the first game we won't get too high when we win or too low when we lose,” Devine said in the post-match presentation ceremony. 

Although she was aware of the challenges of playing six-time champions Australia, the 35-year-old resolved to learn from her team's mistakes in this game and improve in her two remaining games against Sri Lanka and Pakistan. 

“In the field we were sloppy and with the bat, we need to be more courageous and that's what we need to do to win games in this World Cup. We have got two games to go and we have to make sure that we keep ourselves in a good position to qualify for the semi-finals,” she said. 

“Taking it one game at a time, not focussing too far ahead. First, we need to win our next game which is against Sri Lanka, our most important game, they bring a different challenge with Chamari who is a big threat.”

While Australia will be up against Pakistan in their next match on October 11, the Kiwis will play Sri Lanka a day later on October 12. 

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