No.1 ranked Australia favourite to win fourth consecutive ICC Women’s World Twenty20 title

England is the only other side to have won the tournament when it clinched the inaugural edition of the competition in 2009 in its backyard. Charlotte Edward’s side is closely behind Australia in the MRF Tyres ICC Women’s Team Rankings having finished as runner-up in the 2012 and 2014.

Host India is coming into this tournament following a home series win against Sri Lanka. Mithali Raj’s girls will be keen to fully utilise familiar conditions and pull off a few surprise results against higher ranked Australia, England and third-ranked New Zealand.

The 10 women’s sides are divided into two groups, with Group A featuring Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa and Sri Lanka and Group B including India, England, Pakistan, Bangladesh and West Indies. The top two sides from each group will progress to the semi-finals.

Based on the teams’ rankings Australia and New Zealand are expected to progress to the semi-finals from Group A, while England is likely to top Group B. This means fight for the second place in this group is between India and the West Indies.

The women’s matches will begin on 15 March when host India will take on Bangladesh in an afternoon match starting at 15h00 Bengaluru, whilst New Zealand will play Sri Lanka in an evening match starting at 19h30 in Delhi.

The fifth edition of the ICC Women’s World Twenty20 will feature 10 sides, with eight teams from the ICC Women’s Championship joined by Bangladesh and Ireland, which claimed the top two positions in the ICC Women’s Twenty20 Qualifier 2015.

A total of 23 matches will be played in the women’s competition, including the semi-finals and the final which will be played before the men’s knock-out matches on the same day and at the same venues. Out of 23 women’s matches, the ICC will produce broadcast coverage of a record 13 matches, which, in turn will be carried around the world by ICC’s Global Broadcast Partner Star Sports and other broadcast partners.

On the MRF Tyres ICC Women’s Team Rankings, 59 points separate top-ranked Australia (129 points) from eighth-ranked Sri Lanka (70 points). England is second on 122 points, followed by New Zealand (114), India (111), West Indies (101), South Africa (94), Pakistan (80), Sri Lanka (70), Bangladesh (47) and Ireland (31).

Australia has an impressive record in the tournament, having won 15 out of a total of 20 matches to date. Nevertheless, it is coming into this tournament having lost T20I series’ to India and New Zealand this year.

Meg Lanning is the number-one ranked batter on the MRF Tyres ICC Women’s T20I Rankings, but she is the only Australia batter to feature inside the top 10. Alex Blackwell, Ellyse Perry and Elyse Villani are in 14th, 15th and 16th positions respectively, while Alyssa Healy in in 18th.

Amongst the bowlers, third-ranked Perry is Australia’s highest-ranked bowler, with Jess Jonassen (ninth), Rene Farrell (11th), and Megan Schutt (18th) the other bowlers to figure in the top 20

England enters the tournament at the back of a 2-1 series win against South Africa. Second-ranked Sarah Taylor is her side’s highest-ranked batter, while captain Charlotte Edwards is sitting in fourth position. Amongst the bowlers, England has possession of the top two spots, thanks to Anya Shrubsole and Danielle Hazell.

New Zealand has played a total of 19 matches in the ICC Women’s World Twenty20 competition and has lost just five. Suzie Bates’ side will start the competition believing that it has a great shot at winning the competition this year.

And giving a boost to its ambitions is the fact that a large number of its players feature prominently in the charts, led by Bates (second) and Sophie Devine (10th) in the batting table and Morna Nielsen (fourth) is the bowling category.

Host India, which got the better of Australia in Australia at the end of January this year, will be confident of a good performance. Its middle-order batter and captain Mithali Raj is sitting in fifth spot, while fast bowler Jhulan Goswami is 12th.

Amongst the all-rounders, Australia’s Perry is in top position, followed by Dane van Niekerk of South Africa and Salma Khatun of Bangladesh. Bismah Maroof of Pakistan is in seventh while Sri Lanka captain Shashikala Siriwardene features in ninth place.

The leading run-scorer and wicket-taker in the ICC Women’s World Twenty20 are Edwards with 566 runs and Perry with 24 wickets.

Australia will go in as the top-ranked side in the tournament, but seven of the eight ICC women’s championship teams have been in action earlier this year, and have shown great fight and potential proving that this tournament will have a number of serious contenders.

While the team rankings will be updated after each match, the player rankings will not be updated until after the conclusion of second-round matches on 28 March.

MRF Tyres ICC Women’s Rankings (as on 13 March)

Rank   Team              Points

1.      Australia           129

2.      England            122

3.      New Zealand    114

4.      India                 111

5.      West Indies      101

6.      South Africa       94

7.      Pakistan              80

8.      Sri Lanka           70

9.      Bangladesh         47

10.  Ireland                 31

(Developed by David Kendix)

MRF Tyres ICC T20I Women’s Player Rankings (as on 13 March)

Batting (top 25)

Rank      (+/-)        Player                   Team     Pts          Avge      S/Rate    HS Rating

   1           ( - )          Meg Lanning        Aus         673         30.64     118         717 v WI at Melbourne 2014

   2           ( - )          Sarah Taylor        Eng         660         31.82     111         721 v Aus at Chelmsford 2013

   3           ( - )          Suzie Bates           NZ          657         26.63     107         659 v SL at Sylhet 2014

   4           ( - )          C Edwards            Eng         647         32.04     106         812 v Pak at Taunton 2009

   5           ( - )          Mithali Raj           Ind          622         36.15     102         761 v WI at Ahmedabad 2011

   6           ( - )          Stafanie Taylor    WI          616         35.67     105         770 v NZ at St Lucia 2010

   7           ( - )          Deandra Dottin    WI          604         24.98     126         649 v Eng at Bridgetown 2013

   8           ( - )          Bismah Maroof   Pak         577         28.04     84           579 v Ban at Karachi 2015

   9           ( - )          M du Preez            SA           543         22.65     96           552 v Eng at Johannesburg 2016

  10         (+1)         Sophie Devine      NZ          532         24.11     113         560 v SL at Christchurch 2015

  11         (-1)          D van Niekerk      SA           528          26.66    86           543 v Eng at Cape Town 2016

  12         ( - )          H Kaur                Ind          526            22.02     93           594 v Aus at Visakhapatnam 2012

  13         (+1)         Lizelle Lee             SA           517!       23.96     94           517 v WI at Cape Town 2016

  14         (-1)          Alex Blackwell     Aus         510         20.60     94           566 v Eng at Canberra 2011

  15         ( - )          Ellyse Perry           Aus         497!       26.46     105         497 v NZ at New Plymouth 2016

  16         ( - )          Elyse Villani          Aus         493         26.85     113         591 v Ire at Dublin 2015

  17         ( - )          Isobel Joyce          Ire           491         20.96     93           528 v Pak at Sylhet 2014

  18         ( - )          Alyssa Healy        Aus         490        19.47     113         513 v Ire at Dublin 2015

  19         ( - )          Lydia Greenway  Eng         488        25.25     96           601 v SA at Potchefstroom 2011

  20         ( - )          C Shillington         Ire           468        17.40     96           612 v Pak at Dublin 2013

  21         ( - )          C Jayangani         SL           466        16.53     87           482 v NZ at Nelson 2015

  22         (+1)         Cecelia Joyce       Ire           447 !      19.78     76           447 v Ban at Bangkok 2015

  23         (+1)         Salma Khatun      Ban        442*      17.90     88           452 v SL at Sylhet 2014

  24=       (+1)         S.D.Siriwardene SL              433          18.60    84           521 v Ban at Sylhet 2014

                (-2)          Trisha Chetty       SA           433          17.57    90           522 v SL at Potchefstroom 2013

Bowlers (top 25)

Rank      (+/-)        Player               Team     Pts          Avge      Eco.        HS Rating Ranking

  1            ( - )          A Shrubsole          Eng         669         12.73     5.52       678 v Aus at Cardiff 2015

   2           ( - )          Danielle Hazell     Eng         642         19.22     5.22       685 v NZ at Chelmsford 2011

   3           ( - )          Ellyse Perry           Aus         641         19.12     5.73       686 v NZ at Nelson 2010

   4           ( - )          Morna Nielsen      NZ          630         17.92     5.05       653 v Ind at Bangalore 2015

   5           ( - )          A Mohammed     WI          625         14.76     5.23       673 v Ind at Ahmedabad 2011

   6           (+1)         Shabnim Ismail   SA           606         19.36     5.67       610 v WI at Johannesburg 2016

   7           (-1)          Salma Khatun      Ban        601         14.57     4.52       650 v Ire at Sylhet 2014

   8           ( - )          I Ranaweera         SL           576         16.00     5.31       594 v Ind at Ranchi 2016

   9           ( - )          Jess Jonassen        Aus         564         19.40     5.34       598 v Ire at Dublin 2015

  10         (+2)         D van Niekerk      SA           559        17.86     5.28       566 v Eng at Paarl 2016

  11         (-1)          Rene Farrell          Aus         558        19.94     6.14       577 v Ind at Sydney 2016

  12         (-1)          Jhulan Goswami  Ind          556        19.40     5.30       671 v Aus at Visakhapatnam 2012

  13         ( - )          U Prabodhani       SL           538          21.80    4.92       657 v Ban at Sylhet 2014

  14         ( - )          Sana Mir               Pak         537          19.46    5.01       636 v Ban at Dublin 2012

  15         ( - )          Nida Dar                Pak         536         18.48     4.97       613 v SA at Doha 2014

  16         ( - )          Poonam Yadav   Ind          524*      11.23     5.40       533 v SL at Ranchi 2016

  17         ( - )          Lea Tahuhu          NZ          514*      16.60     5.39       524 v Aus at Wellington 2016

  18=       ( - )          M Daniels              SA           507        25.64     4.78       516 v WI at Durban 2016

                (+1)         Megan Schutt       Aus         507*!    20.53     5.96       507 v NZ at New Plymouth 2016

  20         ( - )          H.Siriwardene       SL           501        19.95     5.44       603 v Eng at Sylhet 2014

  21         ( - )          Sarah Coyte         Aus         498        20.82     6.10       657 v Ind at Visakhapatnam 2012

  22         ( - )          Isobel Joyce          Ire           494        27.17     5.45       563 v SA at Solihull 2014

  23         ( - )          Katherine Brunt   Eng         493        18.91     4.85       685 v SA at St Kitts (WP) 2010

  24         ( - )          Kim Garth             Ire           492        19.25     5.55       503 v Aus at Dublin 2015

  25         (+1)         Anam Amin          Pak         491*!    21.84     4.89       491 v WI at St George's 2015

All-rounders (top 10)

Rank      (+/-)        Player               Team     Pts          Highest Ranking

1              ( - )          Ellyse Perry           Aus         319!       319 v NZ at New Plymouth 2016

   2           ( - )          D van Niekerk      SA           295        302 v Eng at Cape Town 2016

   3           ( - )          Salma Khatun      Ban        266*/    292 v Ire at Sylhet 2014

   4           ( - )          Stafanie Taylor    WI          259        422 v SL at Bridgetown 2012

   5           ( - )          Isobel Joyce          Ire           243        291 v Aus at Sylhet 2014

   6           ( - )          Suzie Bates           NZ          242        274 v Aus at Taunton 2011

   7           ( - )          Bismah Maroof   Pak         238        248 v Ire at Doha 2014

   8           ( - )          Sophie Devine      NZ          220        304 v Eng at Hove 2010

   9           (+1)         S Siriwardene        SL           217        309 v Eng at Sylhet 2014

  10         (-1)          Deandra Dottin    WI          214        226 v SA at Durban 2016