Born on 3rd November 1990, Ellyse Alexandra Perry is an Australian sportswoman who made her debut for both the Australian cricket and the Australian women’s national soccer team at the age of 16.
The beautiful lady, from the leafy suburb of Wahroonga in Sydney’s North, has become somewhat of an enigma in the cricket world.
Here are the top 14 interesting facts about Ellyse Perry that every cricket fan should know:
1.) Perry became the youngest Australian in international cricket when she made her debut in July 2007 at the age of 16. A month later, she was picked in the Australian women’s football team for the 2008 Olympic qualifiers, where she scored a goal within two minutes of her appearance in her debut against Hong Kong.
2.) Perry is the first Australian to have appeared in both cricket and soccer World Cups.
3.) In 2007, she made her debut for New South Wales and won the WNCL with them, and at the end of the season, she made her Test debut in Bowral against England.
4.) During the season 2007-08, she was the player of the match in her T20 international debut against England and made her maiden ODI half-century against New Zealand.
5) Perry was selected for Australia’s team for the inaugural Women’s World T20 held in England in 2009.
6.) She was a part of the 2010 World T20 winning team in the West Indies and played in all of Australia’s matches. She was also the player of the match in the final.
7.) In November 2010, Perry pushed herself for cricket authorities to combine boys and girls junior competitions following an inspiring and history-making debut for Sydney in a Poidevin-Gray Shield Twenty20 against Blacktown at Drummoyne Oval. She took 2 wickets for 14 runs from four overs and became the first woman in 117 years of Sydney Grade Cricket to take it up to the men.
8.) Perry was in the Australian team as an opening bowler that won the 2013 ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup in Mumbai, India, in which she had to have a painkilling injection in her ankle to play the final.
9.) In June 2015, she was named as one of Australia’s touring party for the 2015 Women’s Ashes in England. She was awarded Player of the Series after making the most runs and taking the most wickets throughout the series.
10.) Perry became the first signing and captain of the women Sydney Sixers in the inaugural season of WBBL and led them to the playoffs and a second-place finish despite losing the first six games in a row.
11.) She married Aussie Rugby player, Matt Touma at the end of 2015.
12.) Perry was named as the Wisden Women Cricketer of the year in 2016.
13.) Ellyse Perry registered a record feat in the ICC Women’s World Cup 2017, scoring five consecutive fifties for the third time in her career.
The astonishing fact is that Perry’s feat is an unprecedented record not just in women’s cricket but in men’s cricket too as neither the greats including Virat Kohli and Kane Williamson have been able to do what the Aussie women’s team star has.
14.) She holds the record of highest Test score for Australia- 213 not out, which she scored on November 11, 2017, during the first innings of a day-night Test match against England in Women’s Ashes series.
