Ireland women call up 13-year-old

Published July 2, 2013
Ireland women's coach Jeremy Bray - Picture courtesy ICC
Ireland women's coach Jeremy Bray - Picture courtesy ICC

Lucy O'Reilly is in line to become the second youngest cricketer to play a women's international match after being called into Ireland's squad on Monday for their World Twenty20 qualifiers later this month.

She was one of 14 players selected in Ireland's squad for the global qualifying event, which will see the hosts competing alongside seven other countries for the three remaining places on offer for next year's World Twenty20, set to take place in Bangladesh.

O'Reilly has already played for Ireland's senior women's team, making her debut in May in the County Championship.

She took two for 15 last weekend as Ireland beat English county Worcestershire by seven wickets in their Division Two game.

Ireland coach Jeremy Bray is unafraid of picking young players as he showed in selecting leg-spinner Elena Tice, then just 13 years and 272 days old, against The Netherlands in August 2011.

If O'Reilly, who doesn't turn 14 until November, plays in the qualifiers she will become the second youngest women's international in the history of the game behind Sajjida Shah, who was 12 when she made her debut for Pakistan.

“While the headlines will be about the teenagers in the squad such as Lucy, Elena, Una Raymond-Hoey and Kim Garth, it shouldn't be forgotten that we've got a spine of experience in there too,” said Bray, the scorer of the Ireland men's team's first World Cup century, in a Cricket Ireland statement.

“Isobel and Cecelia Joyce (twin sisters of Ireland and England batsman Ed) have been stalwarts for over a decade now, while Clare Shillington and Eimear Richardson are also battle hardened.”Ireland have been seeded third and are drawn in the same group as Sri Lanka, Japan and Canada.

Top seeds Pakistan are in the other group alongside The Netherlands, Zimbabwe and Thailand.

The tournament will be held at four venues in the Dublin area (The Hills, Malahide, Merrion and YMCA) from July 23 until August 1.

Opinion

Editorial

Digital growth
Updated 25 Apr, 2024

Digital growth

Democratising digital development will catalyse a rapid, if not immediate, improvement in human development indicators for the underserved segments of the Pakistani citizenry.
Nikah rights
25 Apr, 2024

Nikah rights

THE Supreme Court recently delivered a judgement championing the rights of women within a marriage. The ruling...
Campus crackdowns
25 Apr, 2024

Campus crackdowns

WHILE most Western governments have either been gladly facilitating Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza, or meekly...
Ties with Tehran
Updated 24 Apr, 2024

Ties with Tehran

Tomorrow, if ties between Washington and Beijing nosedive, and the US asks Pakistan to reconsider CPEC, will we comply?
Working together
24 Apr, 2024

Working together

PAKISTAN’S democracy seems adrift, and no one understands this better than our politicians. The system has gone...
Farmers’ anxiety
24 Apr, 2024

Farmers’ anxiety

WHEAT prices in Punjab have plummeted far below the minimum support price owing to a bumper harvest, reckless...