England v Australia
St George’s Road, Harrogate: 11th – 14th August 1998
Australia’s Belinda Clark went in search of a victory when she won the toss and batted in the second Test at Harrogate and made a radical declaration at 3/306, with Karen Rolton (82), Joanne Broadbent (63*) and Clark (76) herself scoring half centuries.
“It was simply a case of trying to work into a position to win the Test. The fact you only had 4 days and the wickets were good meant you needed to find ways of mounting pressure on the opposition. Being bold with the bat was our method to ensure we had enough time to dismiss the opposition twice. This comes with a risk but we played better when we had a very clear purpose which was to win the match.” – Belinda Clark
England lost Charlotte Edwards run out for 48, but Jan Brittin again collared the bowling, proving impossible to budge as she bettered her first Test effort, with 167.
“Brittin was a very good player. A classical technique and she just didn’t make many mistakes. This meant that she was hard to dismiss. It was a case of cat and mouse to leave options for her to score to keep the game moving.”
Karen Smithies declared the England innings at 8/326. Cathryn Fitzpatrick bowled her heart out and deserved her 4 scalps from 43 overs.
“There’s a few bowlers that don’t like the ball being taken away from them. Cathryn is one of them. She was a fierce competitor who used all her nous and physical speed. She was always working on deceiving the batters.”
There was simply no time to set up a match, and certainly nothing in the wicket would allow Clark to manufacture a result with a daring second innings declaration. The placid wicket provided some batting practice and little else, the second Test fading away to the second draw of the series.
Australia 3 decl 306 (Rolton 82, Clark 76, Broadbent 63*) and 5 decl 303 (Keightley 90, Rolton 65*, Broadbent 56, Clark 54) drew with England 8/326 (Brittin 167, Edwards 48, Fitzpatrick 4-91) and 0/64 (Edwards 42*)