Ellyse Perry became the first cricketer, male or female, to reach the milestone of 1000 runs and 100 wickets in T20Is. During the second T20I of the multi-format, points-based Women’s Ashes series at Hove on Sunday Perry scored an unbeaten 47 off 39 balls to register the unique record to her name.
England were restricted to 121/8 in their 20 overs that Australia chased down with 13 balls left. She had bagged her 100th wicket by dismissing Nat Sciver in the World T20 final in November. On Sunday she hit a boundary to bring up the 1000-run mark during the chase and registered her name to record book. Earlier it was Shahid Afridi who almost had reached the milestone with 1416 runs and 98 wickets. The next in the queue for men’s cricket is Shakib Al Hasan with 1471 runs and 88 scalps. Going by the form Shakib looks like the best contemporary to join Perry at the soonest in near future.
Perry has been impressive during the series as she was the chief-architect in three of her team’s five wins so far. No wonder she grabbed her fourth Player of the Match award of this tour. But overall she is a more dominant cricketer in 50-over cricket. So far she has scored 1005 runs in 104 matches with just three fifties and is yet to score a hundred. But the way she carrier her team to the finishing line was a work of sheer class and talent.
While talking about the record she mentioned that she was not aware about any such thing. She added, “I actually think in T20 cricket at international level, we probably play it as much as the men, so I have played a pretty big volume of games now – over 100, so I suppose when you’ve played 100 games you might get close to it. That’s probably the only reason I’m there – because I’ve played a lot of games.”
Perry opined that the chase was not easy and tricky. It was important to keep a balance. She was excited to be involved in a partnership with Meg Lanning. Their partnership of 87 runs was instrumental for the Aussies to clinch the win. “It was really cool to be out there with Meg. I really enjoy batting with her and she’s incredible when she’s going. To be at the other end is quite easy really.”