BRYCE HAILS SCOTS' BRILLIANT START TO WORLD CUP WARMUPS
Scotland captain Kathryn Bryce is delighted with her team's buildup to the ICC Women's T20 World Cup so far, after two morale-boosting warmup victories over the weekend in Dubai.
On Saturday, Scotland demolished UAE with bat and ball, winning comfortably by 83 runs, before they edged a thriller on Sunday against West Indies by two runs. The latter result in particular provides the Scots with plenty of optimism, ahead of meeting the same opponents in Group B in just under a fortnight.
Amongst the individual highlights across the weekend were an unbeaten 67 for Bryce against UAE, 3-21 and 2-5 for Hannah Rainey and Abtaha Maqsood respectively against the same opponents, and an impressive 3-24 and 2-16 for Katherine Fraser and Chloe Abel during a pressurised contest with West Indies that went down to the wire.
"The two games have been a brilliant start to our preparation for the World Cup," said Bryce. "Getting out there and used to the heat, allowing everyone to get used to the conditions, and playing together again has been fun.
"To earn a win against the West Indies feels great. It's a real scalp for us to get on the board, and although we didn't play our best cricket all the way through the match, it's just brilliant preparation for us to face a team that we know we're going to come up against in the group stages.
"We're starting to put performances together, and we know we can execute our plans under pressure, so it's been a really pleasing start to our tour, knowing what lies ahead. We're really looking forward to the fixtures this week, and finalising our prep ahead of the tournament beginning."
Scotland face West Indies in their third unofficial warmup match on Tuesday, before official fixtures against Pakistan (Saturday 28 September) and Sri Lanka (Monday 30 September). They begin their World Cup campaign against Bangladesh on October 3 in Sharjah.