New Zealand have reached the T20 World Cup semis as underdogs, and emotions are already running high for two of the team’s most celebrated players
Valkerie Baynes16-Oct-2024Sophie Devine struggled to keep it together.The emotions had already spilled over after reaching the T20 World Cup semi-finals as probably the biggest underdogs until West Indies did it 24 hours later. Now her focus turned to sharing that moment with fellow White Ferns stalwart Suzie Bates and it was almost too much.”Jeez, you’re going to make me cry again, get the tissues ready,” Devine said before taking a long pause and a deep breath to ensure she could get the rest of her words out.”Sometimes I forget how lucky I’ve been to play with Suze. I forget how lucky I am that not everyone gets to play with Suzie Bates and that’s not just what she does on the field, it’s what she does off the park.”You talk to any cricketer that’s had the joy of playing alongside her, playing against her, and they’ll say that she’s one of the greatest humans ever. For us to be here in this tournament, it might be our last, who knows?”But to be able to have a little moment there and just connect with one another, it is really special because we’ve been through a lot together. We’ve grown up together. She’s probably grown up a bit more than me, but she’s just such a special human, not only to me, but to New Zealand cricket and to world cricket.”She’ll go down as one of the absolute legends of the women’s game and to think that I’ve been so lucky to spend my whole career playing alongside her… she’s taught me so much, not only as a leader but just as a person and to always want to be better for yourself and for the group.”Related
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Bates made her debut in an ODI against India in 2006 aged 19, just a few months before a 17-year-old Devine made her first appearance for the White Ferns on their tour of Australia. Devine also made her T20I debut on that trip while Bates had to wait until the following year.Back then, Bates was still maintaining a elite-level basketball career, representing New Zealand at the 2008 Beijing Olympics before switching her focus to cricket.She has now played 169 T20Is and 163 ODIs with more than 10,000 runs and 136 wickets across the two formats, while Devine has 7,233 runs and 208 wickets from a career punctuated by a brief mental health break in 2021.New Zealand hadn’t reached the knockout stages of the T20 World Cup in eight years so, with both approaching the end of their careers, this meant a lot.”She was a bit emotional, Soph,” Bates told ESPNcricinfo’s Powerplay podcast. “It just makes all those hard times when perhaps you’ve doubted yourself, you’ve doubted where the group’s heading and as leaders you’re trying to rack your brain about how to move forward, there’s some good times but there’s some dark times as well when you don’t quite achieve what you want to achieve.”Moments out there when you take that final wicket and realise we’ve made it to the semi-final for the first time in eight years, it makes all those tough times worth it.”Devine had said before the tournament that it would be her last assignment as T20I captain. She will continue to lead the side in ODIs but wanted to clear a path for the next generation.”Her leadership this tournament after announcing she was going to step down has just been absolutely brilliant,” Bates said. “She wears her heart on her sleeve and I know as a leader she takes the losses pretty hard so to be able to get that one for her in her last tour as captain, everyone was a bit emotional and she’s been such a great leader of this squad so it’s nice for her to have this feeling.”It wasn’t the first time Devine had been reduced to tears at a T20 World Cup but, unlike in South Africa 20 months ago, she was happy. Back then, the White Ferns’ campaign was in tatters following heavy back-to-back defeats at the hands of Australia and South Africa and the road ahead looked so very long.Even earlier this year, Devine had spoken of a lack of depth coming through the New Zealand system because of a small population, competing sports and a need to bridge the gap between elite and development pathways.Things didn’t look to be improving immediately before the World Cup either as New Zealand entered the tournament having lost 10 T20Is in a row to England and Australia. They even lost a warm-up game against England two days beforehand.But a comprehensive win over South Africa in another warm-up just before that, followed by their upset of India in their opening World Cup game gave the White Ferns confidence.Devine performed well in both those victories, but throughout the tournament she has been impressed by youngsters like spinners Eden Carson and Fran Jonas and 20-year-old wicketkeeper Isabella Gaze.On the bench for New Zealand’s final group game against Pakistan, whom they thrashed by 54 runs to seal their place in the last four, were young seamer Molly Penfold, and experienced bowlers Jess Kerr, Hannah Rowe and Leigh Kasperek, which Devine saw as a promising sign for the future, which had looked bleak not so long ago.”Well, one thing’s still the same, I seem to be crying,” Devine said. “It’s really important that we reflect on where we’ve come from in terms of that South Africa World Cup. We learnt a lot about ourselves not only from that World Cup but the following 12-18 months.”It’s going to take time to build depth, especially in a country as small as New Zealand, it’s not going to happen overnight. It’s really positive signs, but we know that this is just part of the journey. We’re moving in the right direction, but there’s still a long way to go.”Sophie Devine on her relationship with Suzie Bates: “We genuinely just love each other and love seeing each other succeed”•Getty ImagesWhile a T20 captain won’t be chosen until next year, a logical choice could be Amelia Kerr. She has acted as stand-in captain before and is often seen talking tactics and moving fielders with Devine and Bates, representing the blend of experience and youth between the squad’s newcomers and the old heads.At just 24, Kerr has played 83 T20Is and 74 ODIs and has been a fixture on the global franchise circuit. Heading into the semi-finals, she is the competition’s leading wicket-taker with 10 at an average of 7.20 and economy rate of 4.90.”That was probably one of my earliest learnings when I stepped into the leadership and captaincy role, I thought I could be everything to everyone and it’s just not possible,” Devine said.”I want to fix things and I want to help people and I want to make sure everyone’s okay, but I’m also not that person for everyone. So, to be able to call on the likes of Suzie and Melie as well, I feel really fortunate that I’ve got that support around me.”It’s taught me a lot around leadership. It’s not managing people, it’s just relationships and caring about people. That’s one of our greatest values in this White Ferns group, is we speak a lot about caring for one another as people before cricketers.”I hope that you can see that out there with the way that we celebrate one another’s successes. We genuinely just love each other and love seeing each other succeed.”