Who makes the first group as we begin the countdown of the best female players of the last 25 years?
25-Sep-20242:51
Would Suzie Bates rather face Lea Tahuhu or Hayley Jensen?
Everyone loves a ranking list, right? Following on from our colleagues in ESPN, who have been running lists of the top athletes of the century on their platforms, we thought the 2024 Women’s T20 World Cup was a good time to look back over the 21st century so far and select the top 25 female cricketers.Will the player you expect to finish No. 1 finish here? Will a player be ranked too high? Will your favourite player be ranked too low or not make the list (sorry if that’s the case). You’ll find out over the next three days.The game has evolved dramatically over the time frame under consideration for this list, particularly in the last decade with the advent of the WBBL, followed by the Hundred and WPL. More international teams are now beating each other and this upcoming World Cup has the potential to be one of the most competitive.A group of ESPNcricinfo writers came up with a longlist of 50 names, which were then put into a voting system that played off pairs against each other. Once that was completed, a smaller group then assessed the list for anomalies or glaring omissions.Here, present Nos. 25-16 on the rankings. You can check out Nos. 15-6 here and 5-1 here.Note: only achievements posted after January 1, 2000 are taken into consideration, even if the athlete’s career ran either side of the millenniumStats for 2000 and beyond
Test batting | Test bowling | ODI batting | ODI bowling | T20I batting | T20I bowling | All T20 batting | All T20 bowling25: Sarah Taylor (England)Sarah Taylor: legendary behind the stumps, and not bad with the bat•Getty ImagesWhen Adam Gilchrist calls you “the best wicketkeeper in the world… male or female” the world’s media notices. But anyone familiar with Taylor would know the slick dismissal of Sune Luus in a 2018 ODI he was referring to was just one in an impressive line-up of brilliant leg-side stumpings in an England career spanning 13 years. During that time she amassed 6533 international runs and 232 dismissals. With gloves and bat, she was pivotal to England’s World Cup victories in 2009 and 2017. Mental-health breaks punctuating her career helped normalise conversations around anxiety, and she broke down barriers elsewhere too. From the 1st XI at Brighton College to the Birmingham Premier League and Australian grade cricket, Taylor proved she could match it with her male counterparts, and she went on to forge a successful coaching career with a number of men’s sides, including Sussex, Abu Dhabi and Manchester Originals. 24: Beth Mooney (Australia)Beth Mooney’s masterful 125 not out in a chase against India gave Australia a record 26th ODI win on the trot•Albert Perez/Getty ImagesIt would be hard to a find a more versatile batter than Mooney. She has developed into a player who can adapt to whatever role is asked of her, whether opening the batting in Tests or T20s, or being a middle-order star in ODIs. Mooney was part of the destructive opening stand that decided the 2020 T20 World Cup final against India, and in 2021 produced one of the finest ODI innings in a chase against India. In 2022 she remarkably returned to action during the Ashes barely a week after breaking her jaw. On the domestic scene she is the leading run-scorer in WBBL history. 23: Stafanie Taylor (West Indies)Stafanie Taylor: a World Cup-winning captain as well as the Player of the Tournament•AFPA hard-hitting opener, Taylor has been unstoppable since her debut T20I innings, when she made a 49-ball 90 as a 17-year-old. She’s not just brilliant with bat and ball but is one of West Indies’ most decorated captains. At 19 she became the youngest woman to make 1000 ODI runs, and she took over as West Indies captain at 24. Her biggest moment as captain came in 2016 when she led West Indies to the T20 World Cup title, helping beat three-time champions Australia. She led from the front through that campaign, scoring a crucial 59 in the thrilling final and finishing as the Player of the Tournament for her 246 runs and eight wickets. Her performance against New Zealand in 2013, where she became the first woman to score a century and take four wickets in an ODI, exemplifies her all-round prowess. Taylor is also the only woman with over 5000 runs and 150 wickets in ODIs. 22: Katherine Sciver-Brunt (England)Katherine Sciver-Brunt: injuries didn’t keep the long-time leader of England’s attack down for long•Getty ImagesThe England fast bowler’s career was a roller-coaster: a superb all-round showing in England’s first women’s Ashes win in 42 years, in 2005, was followed by a spate of injuries – a troublesome back being at the centre of it – a few years later, which made her contemplate retirement. She then found her mojo again to finish as one of England’s, if not the world’s, greats. Sciver-Brunt was feisty, passionate and rapid. Her ability to swing the ball at high pace made her a ferocious threat, and she finished with the most five-wicket hauls (five) by a fast bowler in women’s ODIs. 21: Cathryn Fitzpatrick (Australia)Cathryn Fitzpatrick: a fast-bowling trailblazer•Daniel Berehulak/Getty ImagesThough there have been major advancements in the game, particularly in fast bowling, since her time, Fitzpatrick’s record still shines. Renowned as the fastest bowler to have played in her day – an accolade that would stand against today’s quicks – her numbers in the seven years she played from 2000 onwards are superb: 127 ODI wickets at 16.88 and an economy of 3.10, and 44 in seven Tests at 13.56. In 2003 she became the first bowler to claim 100 ODI wickets. Although it was towards the latter stages of her career, she was a key part of Australia’s 2005 World Cup victory in India. Her overall tally of ODI wickets was only surpassed by Jhulan Goswami in 2017. 20: Amelia Kerr (New Zealand)Amelia Kerr: the present and future for New Zealand•AFP/Getty ImagesAt 17, the legspin-bowling allrounder broke former Australia captain Belinda Clark’s 21-year-old record for the highest individual score in women’s ODIs when she amassed 232 not out against Ireland. Kerr followed it with career-best returns of 5 for 17 in the same match to lead her team to a 305-run win. Kerr announced herself the previous year, with the wickets of Australia’s Meg Lanning, Elyse Villani, Beth Mooney and Alyssa Healy in her sixth ODI. Earmarked as a potential star, Kerr has since established herself as a vital cog in the New Zealand side in the last few years with consistent batting and bowling performances. She has gone past 3000 international runs and taken 150-plus wickets. 19: Charlotte Edwards (England)Charlotte Edwards remains England’s most successful captain in women’s cricket, with 72 wins in ODIs and 68 in T20Is•Getty ImagesEdwards, who represented England 309 times, 220 of those as captain, was not only a prodigious talent but an enduring one. After taking over the captaincy in 2006, she led England as they retained the Ashes in Australia, achieving back-to-back victories against the Australians, in 2013 and 2014. She also took England to the World Cup-World T20 double in 2009. The England record of nine ODI centuries Edwards shared with Nat Sciver-Brunt and Tammy Beaumont was only broken in September 2024, eight years after her last game. Her leadership has continued post-retirement as a highly successful coach in the women’s game. 18: Laura Wolvaardt (South Africa)Laura Wolvaardt is among the most stylish batters in the game and now has centuries across all formats•BCCIShe could have been a medical student or a musician but Wolvaardt chose to pursue a career in cricket and quickly rose to the top of the class. Armed with a selection of textbook shots, including one of the smoothest cover drives in the game, Wolvaardt uses traditional technique to dominate contemporary cricket. She is South Africa’s leading run-scorer in ODI cricket and their only player to have made more than 4000 runs in the format, and is closing in on the T20I record, with the three players above her now retired. Wolvaardt is one of only three women’s players to have scored a century in all three formats of the game, and the only one to have do it in one calendar year. That was also the year after she took on the all-format captaincy long-term, proving her leadership ability at all levels. 17: Suzie Bates (New Zealand)Suzie Bates is second only to Meg Lanning in the list of most ODI hundreds, 13 in 157 innings for New Zealand•Getty ImagesOne of the most respected allrounders in the women’s game, and a former Olympics-level basketball player, Bates has a reputation of being a big-match player and is the leading run-scorer in women’s T20Is. The attacking top-order batter made 168 off just 105 balls in helping New Zealand advance to their fourth ODI World Cup final in 2009, three years after making her ODI debut. She led the side from 2011 through 2018 and did not let captaincy weigh her performances down. In the 2013 ODI World Cup, she topped the batting charts with 407 runs, and was named Player of the Tournament. Bates made 151 off 94 balls on the a record-breaking day in Dublin in 2018 when New Zealand made a massive 491 for 4 against Ireland. In July 2024 she became the first New Zealand women’s cricketer to make over 10,000 international runs. Come October, she is set to play in her ninth T20 World Cup. 16: Sophie Devine (New Zealand)Sophie Devine: has scored a 36-ball T20 hundred•Getty ImagesStarting out as a seam bowler, Devine evolved as a batter with incredible power-hitting, while taking 200 international wickets. At 17 she made her New Zealand debut, but it was when she blasted a magnificent 145 against South Africa in the 2013 ODI World Cup that she took the world by storm. She holds the record for the fastest fifty in women’s T20Is, off 18 balls against India in 2015. Devine had a blockbuster 2019-20 season, when she made her maiden T20I century against South Africa and became the first cricketer of either sex to hit five consecutive 50-plus scores in T20Is. She was named New Zealand captain in 2020, and the following year she struck the fastest women’s T20 century with a 36-ball hundred for Wellington against Otago in Dunedin. A T20 globetrotter with prolific all-round performance, she has a particularly prolific record in the WBBL with four centuries. ESPNcricinfo’s top 25 women cricketer’s of the 21st century: Nos. 1-5 | 6-15 | 16-25
