Captain Hollie Armitage believes the Diamonds didn’t hit top gear despite a dominant win over Western Storm at Taunton today as the region boosted their Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy title hopes.
The visitors posted an imposing 281-3 from their rain-reduced 43 overs with half-centuries from Lauren Winfield-Hill and Leah Dobson the highlight of a highly impressive batting performance.
But despite early wickets, Diamonds allowed their opponents to recover and cut the margin to 31 runs.
“It’s a big trip down to Taunton for us and we really wanted to bounce back after a run of losses,” said Armitage who scored a quick-fire 45 of her own.
“We’ve been disappointed with the way we’ve performed, but we’re really pleased with this performance today, because it keeps us in with a chance of making finals day.
“It was a convincing win, but there are still a lot of things we need to improve upon. We didn’t field well today and dropped a lot of catches, and on another day, that can cost you a game.”
Crucial to the win was the opening partnership of 101 between Winfield-Hill and Sterre Kalis which Armitage believes spread confidence throughout the rest of the batting line-up.
“The way that Loz and Sterre started the innings was really impressive, because the ball was moving about for the first hour,” she said.
“They did a brilliant job of setting the tone and providing a platform from which Leah Dobson and myself could accelerate.
“There is added responsibility upon Leah and Emma Marlow to do well in the middle for us and they will have learned a lot from today.”
Armitage also gave credit to her spinners who eventually broke Storm’s resistance.
“We knew getting Sophie Luff and Fran Wilson out would be key for us and I kept changing the bowling in the hope of picking up a wicket,” she added.
“In the end, I called upon spin at both ends because we were behind on time, and it ended up paying off for us.”
