England expect Ecclestone to play through pain in Cricket World Cup semi

Nat Sciver-Brunt says she expects Sophie Ecclestone to play in Wednesday’s World Cup semi-final against South Africa, despite the shoulder injury sustained in their match against New Zealand on Sunday.

A subsequent MRI scan on Ecclestone’s left shoulder revealed a minor injury to the joint next to her collar bone, but the left-arm spinner was due to train with England on Tuesday evening.

Sciver-Brunt, the England captain, did acknowledge that Ecclestone might struggle to bowl her full allocation of 10 overs, but said the team were confident they had the options in their lineup to deal with that situation if it arose. Ecclestone bowled only four balls on Sunday, leaving England dependent on the part-time off-spin of Alice Capsey and the barely-ever-seen leg-spin of Sophia Dunkley.

“I’m pretty confident that she’ll be ready for tomorrow’s game,” Sciver-Brunt said “She [Ecclestone] might not be 100%. Hopefully a bit of adrenaline will help her but we showed in the game against New Zealand that we were able to adapt the bowling plans.”

England will also take confidence from the fact that it was their other left-arm spinner Linsey Smith who dealt the critical blows in their earlier group-stage match against South Africa. On that occasion England triumphed by 10 wickets after bowling their opponents out for 69 – Smith skittling through Laura Wolvaardt, Tazmin Brits and Marizanne Kapp to leave them reeling.

“She’s been absolutely massive for our side,” Sciver-Brunt said of Smith, who has taken the same number of wickets as Ecclestone in the tournament – 12 apiece. “It’s always a big responsibility to open the bowling but she’s taken it in her stride and really thought differently about the way she bowls.”

South Africa came unstuck against Alana King in their final group game against Australia. Photograph: Unnati Naidu/SPP/Shutterstock

That collapse could be seen as a once-in-a-blue-moon blip, were it not for the fact that South Africa nigh-on repeated the feat in their most recent outing of the World Cup, blown away for 97 by an Alana King-inspired Australia.

South Africa’s captain, Wolvaardt, is thus faced with the formidable challenge of dusting her side off from two dreadful batting performances, while simultaneously trying to convince them that they have the capability to defeat England – a side they lost to in the semi-finals of the 2017 and 2022 World Cups, and who they have defeated only once in their past eight ODI encounters.

“I think for me tomorrow it’ll just be about keeping everyone as calm as possible,” Wolvaardt said. “Fifty overs is a very long time and it’s very easy to let the pressure of a semi-final get to you. But they’re under a lot of pressure as well. The calmest team out there will most likely win.”

Wolvaardt herself exemplifies calmness at the crease, having already scored three half-centuries this tournament from the top of the order. She will be critical to her side’s hopes of making history on Wednesday – they have never reached a 50-over World Cup final. That puts England as firm favourites, an unfamiliar and perhaps uncomfortable label given their own recent turmoil.

“To be in a knockout stage of a World Cup this early on in our tenure is really special,” Sciver-Brunt said, reflecting on the first six months of her partnership with the head coach, Charlotte Edwards. “We started the tournament unsure of where we were compared to the other teams in the world. But we always wanted to come to the tournament to try and win, regardless of where we were in our journey.”

“We’ve been a side in transition, on a journey, and as a captain that’s the same for me. So I’m massively excited to be in the knockout stages of this World Cup and to take on the game tomorrow.”

The returns of England’s middle order have been so poor that Edwards was forced to bring in Danni Wyatt-Hodge at the 11th hour to face New Zealand, presumably as a way of giving her some time in the middle before throwing her into the semi-final. A score of two not out from seven balls is not, it must be said, ideal preparation for a must-win game and could yet come back to haunt England.

As ever, England must lean on both their current captain and her immediate predecessor, Heather Knight. Knight is their leading tournament run-scorer – 288 at an average of 58 – having fought her way back from a serious hamstring injury to feature in this World Cup. “It’s like she was never away,” Sciver-Brunt said.

Still, even this comeback queen will be acutely aware that at the age of 34 she may not see another 50-over tournament: it is do-or-die time in Guwahati.