After missing out twice, Tahlia McGrath finally wins WBBL:
Two editions of hard luck and near misses did not let Tahlia McGrath abandon her dream of lifting the Women’s Big Bash League trophy, which finally paid off this year when the Adelaide Striker’s Skipper held the trophy in her hands and celebrated the success with her teammates.
The captain of the Adelaide Team, Tahlia McGrath who was named as the Aussies vice captain just a few days ago after Rachael Haynes announced retirement, has had a year full of triumphs. The right handed batter has been a part of ODI World cup and Commonwealth games winning Australia squad. Apart from that, the Aussies all-rounder helped her side supersede the English women in the latest Ashes season as well. However, for Tahlia, none of the above victories are as ‘special’ as getting crowned as the WBBL winner. T-Mac, as people love to call her, said when asked about the victory, “This one is special for different reasons. My home state, something I’m very passionate about, has been there since day one. This one is pretty special. There’s World Cups, there’s Comm Games, but this is special for different reasons”.
“This one has been a long time in the making. When you get so close so many times, you keep the same group together, you keep fighting and you finally get one. So this one is pretty special.”
The Adelaide Strikers finished as the runners-up in the last edition of WBBL after they were forced to bag an unfortunate defeat by the women of Perth Scorchers. Their track record has another instance of losing a final by a close margin, which happened back in the 2019 edition of WBBL. Both times the Strikers were close to clinching the trophy but were deprived of the title. This time, however, the North Sydney Oval witnessed the Striker Women pushing their limits to exhibit their finest cricketing skills against the two times champions, the Sydney Sixers. Batting first, the Strikers put up a target of 148 runs with the help of Deandra Dottin’s 37-ball-52 runs adorned with 6 fours and 2 maximums.
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With the ball, the Strikers were phenomenal as well. Deandra Dottin displayed a complete all-round performance and scripted two strikes to her name while conceding only 30 runs in her 4 over spell. Complementing her, Darcie Brown dismissed two batters in 4 overs as well at the expense of only 3.75 runs per over.
They say Catches win the Matches but the Adelaide women even defied this theory as well. Whether it was sheer dumb luck, the Strikers compensating for the dropped catches in the other departments or as their Skipper says ‘the team’s calm’, the two dropped catches in a single over did not end up haunting the Strikers for another year. Talking about this, the skipper said, “It’s never ideal dropping catches but, again, we just stayed calm. Our bowlers were amazing. I would back us to defend any total and once again they did the job today.”
The way the Strikers played in the final gave a clear message to everyone that the McGrath-led women were in it to win it this time and so they did. The sky of North Sydney Oval celebrated gleefully with the Adelaide’s women while they soared with their first WBBL trophy.
