West Indies Women’s team captain, Stafanie Taylor is ecstatic about cricket returning as she moves closer to another milestone.
Taylor’s side is preparing to face England Women in the five-match Vitality T20I series later this month. Since the ICC Women’s World Cup in March, cricket plunged into a five-month break due to the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and will see this series being the first women series since the break.
The 29-year-old is 14-runs short of becoming only the second woman in the format to reach 3000 runs while she is 11 wickets away from being the fourth lady with 100 T20 wickets. If she reaches those milestone, she will be the first woman to complete this double.
Only Deandra Dottin (2380 runs and 59 wickets) and Sophie Devine (2384 runs and 87 wickets) have over 2000 runs and 50 wickets in T20Is.
Taylor has not yet scored a century in T20Is but has reached a 50-plus score on 21 occasions. Suzie Bates currently heads the list of most 50-plus scores with 22 to go along with her one century. The West Indian captain has been one of the most consistent batters in the format with an average of 36.39 which is the fourth highest among any batter.
The Jamaica-born leader has already made her presence felt after scoring 71 in the inter-squad practice match earlier this week.
Despite the prestigious accomplishment being in close proximity, Taylor revealed that she has not put much thought into it and in fact, she has not yet set herself any goals or accomplishments she would want to achieve on tour.
“It’s pretty much at the back of my mind, I am just happy to get back out there and back to playing, we’ve been away for quite a while and I am excited and eager to get back out there,” she expressed.
Taylor added, “I guess it’s a great feeling to reach another milestone, anyone would be really grateful after all the years playing and actually achieving something now. I guess for me it’s just another milestone. I don’t think much of it. Whenever I go out there I pretty much do whatever I can for the team, always put the team first.”
Meanwhile, with the conditions being unfamiliar due to the new norms stipulating a bio-secure venue and pre-series isolation in ‘the bubble’, Taylor noted that life in the bubble has been going well.
“It’s been really good, we have here some games that’s been really enjoyable and we have been able to utilize it pretty much to our comfort so it’s been really good, we’ve been able to do some fun stuff like pools and shooting baskets and also do some target practice,” she disclosed.
