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Kim Garth has been one of Women’s cricket’s stand out performers in 2015, leading the Scorchers to glory in the inaugural Super 3’s competition as well as several great performances for Ireland.
On top of that Garth also captained the senior national side on several occasions during their county championship campaign in England.

Recent named by All Out Cricket magazine as one of the top prospects in cricket, Garth can now add the Toyota Women’s International Player of the Year award to her list of achievements in 2015. She spoke exclusively to cricketireland.ie to talk about this season and preparations for the ICC Women’s World T20 Qualifiers that start later this month.

One of the highlights of 2015 for Garth, and the entire squad, was the T20 series with Australia in August, with YMCA Cricket Club in Dublin hosting the World Champions for three high profile home matches for the Women.

“Those games were definitely my favourite games I have played in. The ground was pretty much full for all three games which made it a lot more exciting.

“It’s always nice playing at home, but to play Australia at home in front of a big Irish crowd was amazing.”

Garth might have enjoyed those games against Australia, but the main focus of the year for the Women’s squad has always been, and remains the ICC World T20 Qualifiers in Thailand. The games against Australia were not just for show, they were an important part of the preparation for the qualifiers.

“The games were a huge help. The first game in particular was a massive turning point for the team as I think that was when both players and supporters realised how good the team can be.

“Playing against the best in the world makes you set the highest standards for yourself, we just need to ensure we keep our standards at that level for the qualifiers. The series was a huge boost for the team and came at just the right time before the qualifiers.”

Since that series against Australia the side have continued to work hard on both cricket skills and fitness under Head Coach Aaron Hamilton, with the squad working outdoors in Ireland for as long as they could before retreating to the indoor facility in North County.

Keen to head into the qualifiers fully prepared the side also travelled to La Manga in Spain to take part in a warm weather training camp.

“The weekend as a whole was really good. It was three days of high intensity training and everyone found it very productive. We did a lot of fielding and pressure game situations which is obviously hard to do indoors.

“We had access to performance psychologist David Young as well which was very interesting and I think all the girls took something away from that.”

With just two weeks to go until the squad travels out to Thailand for the qualifiers the sessions are still coming thick and fast in Dublin, with Aaron Hamilton and new assistant Alex Cusack working hard to make sure no stone is left unturned ahead of the qualifiers. One of those stones was a specific power hitting session with Julian Wood, a specialist who has worked with the England Men’s team and also worked with the Irish Men’s team after ensuring the women were fully prepared for Thailand.

“I found it quite interesting, it was definitely a fresh approach to power hitting. It was a good session with drills we wouldn’t usually do. I would definitely be more confident with power hitting having done the session.”

Garth will take a brief break from training on Friday afternoon to collect the Toyota International Women’s Player of the Year award at the 2015 Hanley Energy Awards held in Dublin. She will then travel to Thailand where the Ireland side will play in a warm-up match before taking on the Netherlands on November 28th, China on November 29th and Zimbabwe on December 1st in the group stages of the ICC World T20 Qualifiers.

The top two from the group will progress into semi-finals against the top two sides from a second group containing Bangladesh, Scotland, Thailand and Papua New Guinea, with the winners of those semi-finals progressing to a final and qualifying for the ICC Women’s World T20 in 2016.

During the tournament we will have match previews, live updates and reaction from the squad as well as interviews with players before, during and after the tournament.

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