Shelley Nitschke wants Perth Scorchers' middle-order to be more aggressive

Perth Scorchers coach Shelley Nitschke is hoping for the middle-order to come good when they take on Melbourne Renegades at Drummoyne Oval in Sydney for their third match of the sixth season of the Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL) on Saturday (October 31).



Inclement weather and a Grace Harris special meant Scorchers couldn’t register a win during the opening weekend of WBBL06. On the first day, they lost the match to the reigning champions Brisbane Heat by seven wickets and their second fixture against Hobart Hurricanes was abandoned without a ball being bowled.



During the match against the Heat, Scorcher’s new opening duo of Sophie Devine and Beth Mooney put on a 55-run partnership, but the middle-order failed to build on the promising start, which meant they posted only 132 for 7 in their stipulated 20 overs - a total that proved to be inadequate as Heat easily chased it down with three overs to spare.



“We had a really good review after that game; Soph and Moons did set a really good platform,” Nitschke said on Friday (October 30). “It was tough going out there and the middle-order were trying their best to get the ball to the boundary, but it was quite slow.”



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“We certainly identified there were some areas in the game that we possibly could have gone a little bit harder, and certainly looking forward to see them improve on that, but really proud of the way they went about it. We just needed to put the foot down probably a little bit earlier.



Even though the weather forecast is predicting some rain in Sydney over the weekend, Scorchers' newly appointed coach said the Perth based side will be preparing for both the fixtures as if they are full games and would be hoping for a result.



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“We'll just keep preparing like we're going to have 40 overs each game. And hopefully we can we can get some results rather than having to take a tied game,” she said. “I think it is just such a fierce competition and every team has got the ability to beat any other team on their day.”



“It's been a really good week for getting some good training. We were lucky enough on Wednesday to get outdoors on some turf and have a really good field together. We had another bit of a group session today. So, that's been really important for this group. It's going to go a long way to helping us sort of come together on the field as well.”



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The former Australian allrounder said they will be looking to reassess their strategy depending on the weather conditions and the pitch on a ground that she feels isn’t conducive to high scores.



“It's a reasonable sized ground. The par scores there are probably not as high as some of the smaller grounds that we've been playing on around Sydney. I still expect the wicket will be a reasonable wicket,” Nitchske added.



“But there's been a bit of weather around, so we just have to reassess that (the par score). It's generally a bigger ground that doesn't run that quickly. So, we'll sort of get there and look at what we think of par scores on the day.”



43-year-old Nitchske also feels that the rain-induced break after the first game has allowed the outfit in orange to adjust to hub life. She also lauded Cricket Australia and the WBBL organising committee for the facilities in the athlete's village.







“The WBBL organizing committee and Cricket Australia have done a really good job with what they have provided for the girls and there's a good vibe around the place. So certainly, with everything that we've got here that they've done what they can.”



“They've provided some really good sort of outlets from cricket. It's a really good set up. We couldn't probably hope for more. We've sort of settled into hub life now and we hopefully (can) get on with the job at hand on the weekend,” she concluded.