Thirteen women will travel to La Manga in South Eastern Spain at the end of March to represent an Ireland Women’s Development Squad at a training camp followed by some representative matches. The trip has been made possible due to a women’s funding grant from ICC Europe.
The women’s high performance coach for Cricket Ireland, Nigel Pyne will be travelling with the squad to La Manga and commented upon the announcement of the squad.
‘This is a squad full of players with enormous potential and our selection of it is most definitely with an eye to what we hope signals a bright future for Irish Women’s cricket. All the players selected have displayed an excellent attitude and work ethic during the winter training programme. All have shown real commitment and an understanding of what is required to reach an elite level, putting in focused work week after week and pushing themselves hard on their fitness programmes.’
He continued by discussing the youthful make up of the squad; ‘It’s quite an age spread of players – from 12 to 20 years old – but that demonstrates the growing strength in depth of girls cricket, particularly in the Leinster region. I’m sure, though, having spoken with Nigel Jones recently, it won’t be too long before we have more Northern based players within our National programme.’
Pyne added, ‘The trip itself will be a great opportunity for the squad to progress their development and put their growing skills into practice, and we are very grateful to ICC Europe for their support for this trip and the promotion of the women and girl’s game in general. We hope for a stern test from Berkshire a test that will provide a chance for the more experienced players to lead from the front while the younger members gain valuable experience over a challenging 5 days of T20 and 40 over matches.’
Full fixtures and further details will be announced in the coming weeks.
Ireland Women’s Development Squad:
Clodagh Conway (Rush)
Laura Delany (Leinster)
Jenny Gray (YMCA)
Lauren Hoey (The Hills)
Shauna Kavanagh (Pembroke)
Gaby Lewis (YMCA)
Robyn Lewis (YMCA)
Louise McCarthy (Pembroke)
Hannah McKay (Merrion)
Lucy O’Reilly (YMCA)
Rhiannon Pope (The Hills)
Una Raymond Hoey (Clontarf)
Elena Tice (Merrion)
Laura Delany is in the squad of 13
Cricket Ireland
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