Saturday's third T20I meeting between South Africa and Pakistan in Johannesburg was rained off without a ball being bowled, ensuring the Proteas finished the series as 2-0 victors.
The match was initially delayed following lightning strikes in the area, before constant rain set in at the Wanderers Stadium.
Following a brief break in the rain, an official inspection was announced, and hopes were high of play being able to finally start.
However, the swift return of wet weather meant that two hours after the game was due to start, it was finally called off.
The decision means South Africa win the three-match T20I series 2-0, after triumphing in the first game by 11 runs and in the second by seven wickets.
The teams now head to Paarl - over 1,300km south-west of Johannesburg - for the first of three ODIs between the sides. That is followed by games in Cape Town and Johannesburg, before two Test matches in Centurion and Cape Town.
“We’ve been playing some positive cricket”- Matthews confident West Indies can continue recent good form against India
The West Indies women will be looking to close out an excellent year in the T20 International format with a series win over India in India.
They will take on the Indians in three games at the DY Patil Stadium in Mumbai, home of the Mumbai Indians, the WPL franchise of West Indies captain Hayley Matthews, from December 15-19 before playing three ODIs from December 22-26 in Vadodara.
The Caribbean outfit’s results in T20Is in 2024 include a 4-1 win over Pakistan, 2-1 win over Sri Lanka and a semi-final appearance at the ICC T20 World Cup in the UAE.
India, on the other hand, are coming into this series on the back of a 0-3 ODI series sweep at the hands of Australia. Despite this, Hayley Mathews knows her team will have to play some good cricket to get over the hump.
“I feel like we’ve tried not to focus on what they’re doing too much. We’ve just tried to do all the planning that we can do hence the fact that we've been down here for the last week or so,” Matthews said in a pre-series interview on Saturday.
“They’ve obviously been up against a tough opponent but, at the same time, we know if we want to come down here and beat them we still have to play really good cricket no matter what so that’s what we’re focusing on at the moment,” she added.
The 26-year-old plans to use her two seasons of experience representing the Mumbai Indians and knowledge of the conditions at the DY Patil to try and help the West Indies get their first win over India since 2017.
“I’ve just tried to share the information that I do know about conditions. I would’ve spent some time here playing at DY Patil for the Mumbai Indians and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my time playing at this stadium as well,” she said.
“It’s the first time a lot of the girls are playing here as well. It’s a great ground with great facilities. Hopefully we can get a big crowd out to come out and watch,” she added.
Naturally, some players will also have an eye on the WPL auction which will also take place on Sunday. Matthews says that, while players getting selected would be great, the focus will be on the task at hand.
“I don’t feel like too many of us will be watching it too hard. We obviously know that it is tomorrow but we also have a pretty important T20 match tomorrow as well so I think that’s definitely number one priority,” she said.
“If it is that a few of the girls get picked up, that would be great. The more girls we have playing in these competitions, the better it will be for the team and I think, coming off of a World Cup like the one we’ve just had, it certainly opens up the eyes to the West Indian girls and what they can do so I would absolutely love to see our girls getting picked up,” she added.
As previously stated, the West Indies last defeated India in a T20I series in 2017 and in ODIs, their last series win over India came back in 2012.
Matthews believes the team’s good form over the last year puts them in position to change their fortunes this time around.
“When it does come to our record against India, it hasn’t been the best of late but I think we were going through some sort of transition period within the team and our record against anyone probably wasn’t the best during that period,” she said.
“We’ve been working really hard and focusing on our game and what we can improve. We know it’s going to be a tough assignment but we have been playing some really positive cricket over the last year and back ourselves to go out there and change thing around a bit,” Matthews added.
This series will also give the West Indies an opportunity to experience Indian conditions ahead of next year’s Women’s World Cup scheduled for September-October in India.
“With the World Cup being in India, it’s ideal for us to be playing some cricket down here now,” Matthews said.
The skipper also spoke about the return of Deandra Dottin to the international fold.
“She just an impact player on the whole. She’s obviously a very dangerous player out on the field and something very important in T20 cricket is boundary hitting. There are not many people in the world that can strike a cricket ball like her so it’s important to have her back. Most importantly, she’s enjoyed being back in the group and everyone has taken her in well again,” Matthews said.
Carty becomes joint-fifth fastest West Indian to 1000 ODI runs
Tuesday’s third and final One-Day International between the West Indies and Bangladesh was a historic one for a few reasons.
The first was that the hosts secured a 3-0 series win and their first ODI series win over Bangladesh since 2014.
The second was that Amir Jangoo became the second West Indian to score a hundred on ODI debut with his 104* and the third, and focus of this article, is that Keacy Carty became the joint fifth-fastest West Indian to reach 1000 runs in ODIs.
The 27-year-old reached the milestone during his score of 95 off 88 balls including 10 fours and two sixes at Warner Park in St. Kitts.
Carty’s first 1000 runs in the format have come in just 28 innings, the same amount as Shimron Hetmyer who brought up his thousandth run against Bangladesh at the 2019 World Cup in England.
The only West Indians to reach the mark faster are Nicholas Pooran (27 innings), Ramnaresh Sarwan (27 innings), Gordon Greenidge (23 innings) and Sir Viv Richards (21 innings).
The St. Maarten-born U-19 World Cup winner now has exactly 1000 runs in his 31 ODIs at an average of 43.47 with five fifties and one hundred, his match-winning 128* against England in Barbados last month.
He has also been selected to the West Indies T20I squad for the first time for the upcoming Bangladesh series and will be looking to feature when it gets underway on Sunday at Arnos Vale.
'A disservice to regional cricket': TCA president John slams BCA and GCB for skipping CWI governance reform meeting
As discussions continue about the absence of the Barbados Cricket Association (BCA) and the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) from the recent Cricket West Indies (CWI) governance reform meeting, Tobago Cricket Association (TCA) president Kerwin John believes both did a disservice to regional cricket.
The absence of the BCA and GCB, two of the six territorial boards, halted progress on implementing recommendations from the 2020 Wehby report as a quorum was not met.
Both GCB and BCA subsequently stated their rejection of the Wehby report—drafted by Jamaican business mogul Don Wehby—and objection to CWI’s failure to facilitate a discussion on changing the system of appointing a president.
John, through a Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB) release on Friday, condemned the actions of the BCA and GCB, describing their absence as detrimental to regional cricket and to CWI's efforts to implement much-needed reforms.
"The BCA and the GCB did a great disservice to regional cricket by their shocking action, which can be only described as a dereliction of duty and a betrayal of the trust placed in them by the people who put them in office," the TTCB release stated.
The Wehby report, which proposes modernizing CWI's governance framework, also includes key proposals such as term limits, term durations for the president and vice president, and other measures to strengthen board governance.
CWI emphasized that due notice for the meeting had been issued on November 13, in line with its Articles of Association. This marked the second time the BCA and GCB failed to attend such a meeting, the first being in 2021.
John, who was re-elected for a sixth consecutive term as TCA president last month, criticized the motives behind the absence.
"It was surprising to many that the BCA and the GCB would go to such lengths to make the CWI, to which they belong, look bad in the eyes of the West Indian public and indeed the international cricket community. The desperate move by the two dissident stakeholders is doomed to failure," John said.
His comments echo those of fellow CWI director Arjoon Ramlal, who recently accused the BCA and GCB of attempting to "stymie the progressive push reform overwhelmingly sought by the other members and CWI board."
However, John affirmed CWI’s resolve to push forward with its governance reforms, despite the setbacks.
"The CWI under Dr. Shallow will remain committed to placing cricket first and not give in to selfish and ulterior inclinations, judging from the support we have received for governance changes from all across the Caribbean, including the public in Barbados and Guyana,” the statement ended.
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