TASMANIA has made it a clean sweep against Western Australia to start its 2024/25 WNCL campaign after winning by a sole wicket yesterday.

Western Australia was bowled out for 215, and although Tasmania cut it very fine, the reigning champions ultimately won with nine balls to spare.

After a pretty cheap start to its innings, the home side then recovered with a 60-run second wicket partnership. However, once the wicket avalanche began it was hard to stop for the home side, with no partnerships quite to that scale. The next best partnership was the 29 run fourth wicket partnership.

Mikayla Hinkley was the saviour of the Western Australian innings, with her 62 (which included five fours and two sixes) a real stabilising force in the middle force. Maddy Darke also had a solid enough innings, smashing six fours on her way to 39.

The Tasmanians certainly shared the bowling and wicket taking duties around, but ultimately Callie Wilson, Maisy Gibson, Nicola Carey and Heather Graham all came away with two wickets each.

Tasmania’s chase could not have gotten off to a worse start, finding itself at 1/3 seven balls into its innings.

That start was a sign of what was to come for much of the innings, with the visitors unable to generate partnerships of much size, which saw them find themselves at 8/155.

With things in pretty dire straits, Hayley Silver-Holmes and Gibson showed the Tasmanian tail had some sting in it after all, putting on a 59 run partnership to rescue the innings. Their efforts meant that once Silver-Holmes fell, there was not too much left for Gibson and Wilson to do to get the job done.

Silver-Holmes finished on 31, while Gibson made 30, but earlier in the innings Naomi Stalenberg made 33.

Meanwhile for the home side Chloe Ainsworth was the pick of the bowlers with four wickets, while Lilly Mills took two wickets.