Ami Campbell considering winter's bowling but her three wickets not enough for Yorkshire Women at Essex
Ami Campbell starred with bat and ball but it was spinner Jodi Grewcock whose 3-38 helped Essex hold off Yorkshire in a tense finish at Chelmsford that snapped the home side’s seven-match losing streak in the Metro Bank One-Day Cup.
Grewcock was backed up by fellow Essex spinners Sophia Smale (2-45) and Abtaha Maqsood (1-36), while seamer Esmae MacGregor (2-33) conceded just a single from the 48th over to tilt the contest in Essex’s favour.
Ami Campbell’s belligerent 64 from 49 balls, along with a patient 52 from Sterre Kalis, had threatened to take Yorkshire over the line after they restricted the home side to 241 despite skipper Grace Scrivens’ knock of 87 from 109.
Campbell (inset) earlier played a key role as a stand-in bowler, taking 3-33 when frontline seamer Hannah Rainey had to be withdrawn from the Yorkshire attack after delivering successive no-balls above waist height.
Campbell said: “We battled it out and built some really good partnerships, which is what we’ve been struggling with over the last few games. We may have lost but there were so many personal wins on the back end of that game and I’m proud of how we fought to the end.
“I haven’t bowled since I was 16 and I used to bowl seam! It was going to be me, Sterre (Kalis) or Erin (Thomas) and as a senior player I stuck my hand up and said I’d try and bowl a bit of off-spin – I had no idea how it was going to come out!
“The coaches have just said I’m in the bowlers’ meeting in a few days’ time, which is quite funny! It’s not a very good-looking bowling action but it seemed effective today.
“Over the winter, when I’m going to Australia, I might do a bit of bowling there at club level and see where it takes me – never say never! I’m 35 now.
“I’m the type of batter that wants to put pressure on the bowlers and I had to take the low-risk options for a lot longer today and grind it out a bit. I thought Ducky and Langers put up a great fight as well – I think we were just struggling to find the boundary at the end.”