Photo Credit: Cricket Canada
Cricket Canada has announced the appointment of a three member panel for the selection of its National Women’s teams. The panel will be comprised of two selectors from Ontario: Fowzieh Yaqubien and Suthershini (Sutha) Sivanantham, as well as one: Kim Coulter, from British Columbia. Ontario’s Fowzieh Yaqubien will serve as the Committee’s Chairperson.
The appointments follow Cricket Canada’s 2020 amendment of its Player Selection Policy to incorporate the establishment of a dedicated Women’s Selection Committee. The amendments were made as another significant step towards establishing an independent structure and emphasizing the focus on growing the women’s game.
Nominations were invited from Provincial Cricket Boards and Cricket Canada’s Women’s Committee. The prerequisites for the selectors were that they should have played at the highest level for Cricket Canada or a full member of the ICC. Upon review of the recommendations the Board approved the Fowzieh Yaqubien led three member panel to serve as Cricket Canada’s new National Women’s Selection Committee for a period of two years.
Having represented India in 8 Tests and 13 ODI’s including two World Cups in 1977 and 1982, Fowzieh Yaqubien, is amongst the pioneers of Women’s international cricket. She was instrumental in India’s first ODI win against England represented by Rachel Heyhoe Flint and Enid Bakewell among others, scoring 88 and taking five victims behind the stumps. She holds the record for effecting the most dismissals as wicket-keeper in a single Women’s Cricket World Cup for the 1982 Tournament with 20 dismissals in 10 innings.
Suthershini (Sutha) Sivanantham made her international debut playing for the very first Sri Lankan women’s team in Nov 1997. She captained Sri Lanka from 2002-2003 recording 6-0 victories against Pakistan and West Indies. Her 5 for 2 haul against Pakistan still remains the most economical fiver in women’s ODI history. She led Canada in their T20I series against USA in July 2010, which Canada won 2-0.
A trailblazer in her own right, Kim Coulter started playing cricket when she moved to Canada in 2001.She debuted for Canada in 2006 opening the batting against Bermuda and in her third international game she scored 58. She was part of the Canadian team that defended the America’s Championship in 2009 and 2012 and participated in the ICC Global World Cup Qualifier in 2013.
Cricket Canada’s President Rashpal Bajwa has expressed his Board’s delight over the appointments.
“The establishment of such an impressively qualified National Selection Panel is a most exciting development for Canadian Women’s cricket. Foremost among the eagerly anticipated beneficial outcomes will be the Panel’s continuous identification of sufficiently talented players as candidates for selection to Canadian national teams in the immediate future. This will in turn serve to further boost the already growing levels of involvement in women’s cricket, by increasing awareness of the opportunities the sport offers for individuals to represent Canada at the highest levels of international competition. On behalf of ourselves and the entire Canadian cricket community we wish the Panel’s members every success in the fulfillment of their collective and individual duties.”
