Ashleigh Gardner says Australia must be cautious of a dangerous West Indies side containing Hayley Matthews and Deandra Dottin as they prepare for the first ICC Women’s T20 World Cup semi-final at The Oval on Tuesday, live on Sky Sports.Six-time champions Australia are the favourites to progress to Sunday’s final after they topped Group 1, winning all five of their matches, while West Indies’ route to the last four was a little less straightforward.
They nearly missed out on a berth in the semi-finals after suffering a shock six-wicket defeat to Ireland, which opened up a chance for New Zealand to qualify. Ultimately, West Indies were handed a lifeline by England’s Danni Wyatt-Hodge, who produced an incredible batting performance in the final Group 2 match to knock the White Ferns out of the tournament and send Matthews’ side through.
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Matthews has struggled to score runs so far during the World Cup
Australia and West Indies are familiar opponents, with vice-captain Gardner’s side having claimed T20I and ODI series sweeps against Matthews’ team in March and April, before they faced off in a warm-up match leading into the tournament.Gardner knows the destructive power Matthews and Dottin possess with the bat, even if both players have struggled to score runs so far during the tournament.
“West Indies are a completely different threat [to India]. They’ve got a lot of class and a lot of firepower within their team,” Gardner said.
“They also have a lot of experience, obviously led brilliantly by Matthews, who is a player that can take away a game pretty quickly. But then you look at someone like Dottin, she’s a threat in all three phases of the game.
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Dottin (right) has also had difficulties with the bat, bringing up a combined score of 72 across five innings at the World Cup
“She’s a fantastic player. I’ve had the privilege of playing with her, and seeing how she goes about her cricket, she’s so fearless in the way that she approaches it, which sometimes can be quite scary because she can flip a switch pretty quickly.”Matthews produced a score of 48 off 37 deliveries to help her side defeat defending champions New Zealand by seven wickets in the opening game of the tournament.It was her highest score so far at the World Cup, with the West Indies skipper following that with…
2026-06-29 21:02:00
