THE Murray Downs Diamonds have defended their crown in the Wimmera Girls Cricket League, completing an undefeated season to earn back-to-back flags.
They finished three wins clear of second-place Stawell Strikers and lifted the trophy in the final round at Stawell last Sunday.
Coach Alan Hatcher was overjoyed with his team’s performance.
“They’ve done an amazing job and keep getting better each year – we pretty much had the same team as last season – and they’ve improved out of sight since then, so I’m very proud of what they’ve achieved,” Hatcher said.
While all 11 players had good seasons, there was a clear star among the group, with Issy Boulton winning the competition batting average playing only two games.
“She’s been a standout for several years now and I know the whole league is in awe of her abilities,” Hatcher said.
“She’s the kind of girl who wants to work hard with all her coaches – there’s no reason she can’t end up in the green and gold one day.”
Women’s cricket is going from strength to strength in Swan Hill, with the highly successful Diamonds outfit now being backed up by the Wednesday night Murray Downs Female Competition.
“It’s taken off massively in the past 18 months,” Hatcher said.
“We’ve got 26 girls playing in our local competition, which started this season, and I told those girls if you all bring back one friend next season, we can get to 50 players.”
Hatcher put the rise in popularity down to the beloved Australian women’s cricket team, who earlier this week won another World Cup in South Africa.
“There have been a couple of reasons why it’s gained so much traction, and none bigger than the Women’s World Cup we hosted a few years ago, which has given the girls heroes to look up to,” he said.
“But our original core group of players have driven recruiting big time – they’re always pushing their friends at school to come down for a hit.”
It has been a commanding few seasons for the WGCL benchmarks, losing one game in two years.
According to Hatcher, one of the reasons for their domination was this group of players getting exposed to junior boys’ cricket.
“There’s been a lot of girls in the past five years competing in the boys’ competitions which got them around good coaches and competitiveness before we went over to the WGCL,” he said.
Hatcher said he would look to consolidate the MDFC next season and make it a proper Swan Hill District Cricket Association competition.
