Hayley Matthews' seventh ODI century has propelled the West Indies opener back into the top 10 of the ICC Women's Batting Rankings.
A score of 106 from 109 balls lifted the opener into a share of seventh in the Tuesday update to close out the calendar year, with a rating of 652 to sit alongside Australia left-hander Beth Mooney.
While making a half-century in the same match, a score of four in the third ODI has meant a one-spot drop to third in the rankings (720 rating points), falling below Chamari Athapaththu (733).
Outside the top 10, performers with the bat in Vadodara saw rankings jumps, with Jemimah Rodrigues closing in on a top 20 position (22nd) with a four spot jump thanks to scores of 29 and 52. Richa Ghosh (13 not out and 23 not out) moved seven spots to 41st (448 rating points), with Chinelle Henry's half-century in the third ODI leading to a 21-spot leap to 65th (349 rating points).
Batsman Nicholas Pooran and all-rounder Andre Russell were both included in the ESPNCricinfo T20 team of the year, the website announced on Monday.
Pooran enjoyed a career best year in the format, finishing with 2331 runs in 74 innings in the format in 2024.
He scored those runs at an average of 40.89 and an excellent strike rate of 157.39, hitting one hundred and 15 fifties.
In fact, the 29-year-old was the only batsman to cross the 2000 run mark in the format this year, with South African Reeza Hendricks finishing a distant second with 1970 runs to his name.
West Indies middle order batsman Sherfane Rutherford was named in the ESPNCricinfo ODI Team of the Year on Monday.
Rutherford, a nominee for the ICC Male ODI Player of the Year award, is included thanks to 425 runs in seven innings in 2024 at an average of 106.25 including one hundred, a brilliant match-winning hundred against Bangladesh recently, and four fifties.
Also, West Indies Women’s ODI and T20I captain Hayley Matthews was named in the Women’s T20 Team of the Year.
Cricket West Indies (CWI) president Kishore Shallow has revealed that Ann Browne-John is still part of the selection process for the women’s team.
In July, CWI had announced the conclusion of the contracts of Browne-John and Desmond Haynes as lead selectors for the women’s and men’s senior team programmes. Since then, CWI has adopted a new selection structure that has eliminated lead selectors and in which the head coach is responsible for the final selection of the team.
In a statement at the time, CWI said: “While Dr Haynes and Mrs Browne-John will no longer serve as lead selectors, Cricket West Indies is confident that their contributions in other areas to the sport will not waiver and will seek to utilise their expertise.”
And speaking on the Mason and Guest cricket radio show on the Voice of Barbados, Tuesday, Shallow said Browne-John was still involved.
“She is one of the talent pathway managers which help to identify the talent for women,” he said. “We have identified a male as well, I don’t think they have reached an agreement yet.”
The Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB) has responded to statements by attorney Dinesh Rambally that the Supreme Appellate Committee’s (SAC) decision to dismiss Kiswah Chaitoo’s appeal against his removal as TTCB treasurer in February was flawed.
A TTCB statement on December 23 defended the SAC’s ruling, saying, “Its decisions are based on evidence and legal principles” and the board felt it necessary to respond to Rambally’s claims “to clarify certain points for the benefit of transparency and to preserve the integrity of our organisation.”
Primarily, the SAC, on December 9, found Chaitoo in “flagrant breach” of Article 27 of TTCB’s constitution, which says: “The proceedings of all documents and all meetings of the executive and of the board shall be confidential and not be disclosed to unauthorised persons.” The ruling said Chaitoo breached his “duty of confidentiality” and the SAC deemed its findings sufficient for a vote of no confidence against him.
Rambally, one of Chaitoo’s attorneys, on December 13 highlighted several reasons he thought the SAC was wrong to dismiss his client’s appeal.
