{"id":29079,"date":"2026-03-18T11:10:46","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T09:10:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=29079"},"modified":"2026-03-18T11:15:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T09:15:18","slug":"australia-captain-molineux-fit-for-west-indies-tour-ahead-of-t20-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/australia-captain-molineux-fit-for-west-indies-tour-ahead-of-t20-world-cup\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia captain Molineux fit for West Indies tour ahead of T20 World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>Australia received a boost in their build-up to this year&#8217;s women&#8217;s Twenty20 World Cup after captain Sophie Molineux said she was fit \u200band ready to return for the upcoming white-ball series against \u200cWest Indies.<\/div>\n<div>The 28-year-old was ruled out of the remainder of Australia&#8217;s multi-format series against India after suffering lower back issues following the opening one-day international in Brisbane \u200blast month.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The white-ball tour of West Indies begins on Friday.<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;(I will \u200bbe) playing in the T20s, I am available and looking forward \u2060to playing a role and getting back out there,&#8221; Molineux said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The \u200bbowling all-rounder, who captained Australia in three T20 internationals against India before \u200bAlyssa Healy returned to lead the one-day and test sides, is set to officially take over the captaincy for the Caribbean tour.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>However, her role remains under assessment, with uncertainty \u200bover whether she will feature as an all-rounder.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;Probably just to see \u200bhow we go, especially towards that back end with the one-day games,&#8221; she said.<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;We&#8217;ll \u200cjust \u2060keep assessing but I&#8217;m looking forward to getting back out there again with the girls.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Australia have played only nine T20 internationals since the last World Cup edition in 2024 and Molineux said every match would be \u200bcrucial as they target \u200ba seventh \u2060title.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;I don&#8217;t think we&#8217;re far off at all. It is very hard in T20 cricket to play the \u200bperfect game,&#8221; she said.<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;It&#8217;s just being better for longer \u200band realizing \u2060those moments that can go either way and winning those.<\/div>\n<div>&#8220;We&#8217;re doing everything really deliberately to be able to align ourselves to that style. We&#8217;ve got \u2060a \u200breally hungry group of girls and staff \u200bthat really want to buy into that.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div>The women&#8217;s T20 World Cup begins on June 12 in \u200bEngland and Wales.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u2014Reuters\u2014<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":22148,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-29079","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The white-ball tour of West Indies begins on Friday.","published_date":"","news_description":"The white-ball tour of West Indies begins on Friday.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/29079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/29079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29081,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/29079\/revisions\/29081"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=29079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}