MELBOURNE: The women’s cricket teams of Australia and New Zealand will make their return to the field for the first time since March in a condensed series in Brisbane in September, Cricket Australia (CA) said on Saturday.

The World Twenty20 champions Australia will play their trans-Tasman neighbours in three T20 Internationals and three One-day Internationals over 12 days — the country’s first internationals since the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic shut down almost six months ago.

This week CA said their cricket season was likely to be played in hubs and in a concentrated period of time to comply with strict Covid-19 protocols.

The entire New Zealand squad — which will arrive on Sept 9 — and all Australian players from New South Wales and Victoria states, will need to enter a 14-day quarantine before the series begins.

“We can’t wait to get the season started and what better way to celebrate the return of our world champions,” CA’s interim chief Nick Hockley said. “We’re as confident as ever that we will be able to deliver a schedule of matches that excites and entertains fans across the country and around the world.”

The Meg Lanning-led Australia have not played since sweeping to a fifth World Cup title against India in front of 86,000 at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in March, just before Covid-19 halted sport.

The first T20 game is set to be played at Allan Border Field on Sept. 26, with further matches on Sept 27 and 30 before One-day Internationals on Oct 3, Oct 5 and Oct 7, respectively.

Published in Dawn, August 30th, 2020