Southern Stars set new benchmark: Warner

David Warner says Australia’s women’s cricket team has “set the benchmark” for their male counterparts after regaining the Women’s Ashes on Friday.

The Commonwealth Bank Southern Stars beat England by 20 runs in a low-scoring match in the second T20 International in Hove to clinch the multi-format series with a game to spare.

Following the dominant Test win in Canterbury earlier this month, the Southern Stars were elevated to the top of the women’s Test match rankings, making them the premier team in all three formats of the game.

Warner congratulated Stars skipper Meg Lanning and head coach Matthew Mott on regaining the Women’s Ashes, and wants his side to replicate their stunning achievement.

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“It’s a fantastic achievement,” Warner said. “Winning that over here, they’ve set the benchmark for our Australian men’s team.

“No.1 in all three forms of the game; they’ve been a consistent team for the last 10 years.

“They’ve definitely set the benchmark.

“Credit to Meg and their team and ‘Motty’ the coach.

“They’re setting a great example for Australian cricket and women’s cricket worldwide.”

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Warner and his teammates will have a front row seat on Monday when the Southern Stars take on England in the final match of the Women’s Ashes before the men square off in the afternoon.

Australia’s men’s team is ranked No.1 in one-day cricket, and currently sit in second place in both the Test and T20 arena.

While they’ve won everything thing there is to win in the five-day and 50-over formats, the World T20 title still eludes Australia.

The closest they’ve come was in 2010, losing in the final to England in Barbados under the leadership of the retired Michael Clarke.

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George Bailey, who is in the squad but has stepped away from T20 cricket, led Australia to a semi-final exit in 2012 in Sri Lanka before the team failed to advance from the group stage last year in Bangladesh.

The biggest problem Australia’s T20 team has faced has been the international fixture, which sees T20 matches sprinkled across the Future Tours Program as a third consideration behind Test and ODI cricket.

And for logistical and financial reasons, the T20 team is often made up from the majority of the one-day outfit.

National T20 captain Aaron Finch, who was not considered for selection on this tour while he makes a comeback from a broken foot, told cricket.com.au in May he would prefer more matches to help build a more stable T20 team.

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Warner agrees with his captain, saying that lack of continuity has hindered Australia’s performances in the shortest format of the game and its showpiece event.

“It's like anything – it's playing consistent cricket with the same team,” Warner said.

“When you work a lot with each other over a certain period of time, you can establish and work it out.

“Leading into the World Cup for the one-dayers for example, we had a team that didn't really change as much and you do almost play the same team in the Twenty20s.

“But you're together for a lengthy period of time (with the ODI squad, whereas) we play one T20 every blue moon in Australia.

“It's quite challenging for us to go into a group and go ‘here you go, play this tournament’.”

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However, Australia has an advantage leading in to the 2016 edition.

Hosted in India, it’s where a bulk of Australia’s T20 squad play in the lucrative Indian Premier League, including Warner, Finch, Steve Smith, Mitchel Starc and Glenn Maxwell.

And for that reason Warner says there will be “no excuses” when Australia travel to India next March.

“All the players have played there before (and) play IPL there,” Warner said. “Whatever team is selected there will be the right team for those conditions and I really do think this could be one of our best chances to win the Twenty20 World Cup.

“We've probably played more (in India) than we have at home, in the Twenty20 format.”