Meg will go down as one of the greatest leaders in sport: Mooney
Australia, the most impressive team in women’s cricket in recent years, lived up to expectations as they beat hosts South Africa in the summit match of the T20 World Cup at Newlands Cricket Stadium in Cape Town by 19 runs to lift the coveted title for the sixth time.
After the reigning champions opted to bat first, the reigning champions were propelled to 156 to lose six wickets thanks to a superb 74-of-53 delivery from Beth Mooney that laid the groundwork for the team on a sluggish surface.
In the post-game press conference, the southpaw gave insights into her innings and the team’s performance, saying, “They bowled well on the power play. I thought our power play wasn’t that bad but unfortunately we lost Midge over there.”
“I actually asked one of the girls who ran out if she could ask Shell to retire me because I was so bad off. You know it just goes to show if you last long enough and get the pace off the wicket and probably didn’t have a great plan to go through the middle and try to square it but as I calmed down a bit and it hit a little bit straighter, it wasn’t that bad,” she added.
Mooney also praised Player of the Tournament Ash Gardner for her all-round contributions which help Australia balance their playing XI.
Incredible ash!
Presentation of #T20WorldCup Player of the Tournament pic.twitter.com/ZrPvUe1dQo
— Australian Women’s Cricket Team 🏏 (@AusWomenCricket) February 26, 2023
“She’s matured tremendously off the field over the past few years, and she’s probably also in a good spot in terms of how comfortable and confident she is with her own game.”
“She is very consistent in making some match winning contributions for this Aussie team so I was really impressed with what I saw from Ash and she will be around for a long time so hopefully she can keep producing those games,” said mooney
With Rachael Haynes retiring after the Commonwealth Games and Meg Lanning taking an indefinite hiatus from the sport, Australia have been in trouble ahead of the mega-event.
However, Lanning was back in action in the home series against Pakistan and since then the skipper has had a massive impact on that group and her five world titles as captain are a testament to that.
“Well I got my coffee buddy back so I’m pretty happy and breakfast buddy on game day. When she retires I think she will go down as one of the greatest leaders not only in cricket but in sport. I think she has a huge cricket brain.”
“She’s cool, calm and collected under pressure, and she also has empathy. She understands how people feel in certain situations because she has been there before and experienced a lot as a person and as a leader so she will go down as one of the all time greats for our team and we are very fortunate to have her ” she concluded.