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Ellyse Perry deserves more recognition

Australian footballer and cricketer Ellyse Perry. (AAP Image/Tracey Nearmy)
Expert
12th January, 2014
82
3420 Reads

Ellyse Perry has been a dual international since she was 16, even before she finished her secondary education at PLC Pymble.

Today, Perry resumes the match against England on one with Sarah Elliott five, with Australia needing 128 runs with five wickets in hand to beat England at the WACA.

This Test has been a major breakthrough for the 23-year-old Perry with a career high 71, and a career best 5-38 opening the bowling in the second dig after 3-41 in the first.

Player of the match all sewn up, now for the team victory.

But Ellyse Perry has more media attention, especially pictorially, with her romantic attachment to Wallaby 12 Matt Toomua. Easy to understand, they are a great looking couple.

But Perry deserves as much attention for what she has achieved on the field.

Her Test batting average is 42.75, her bowling 20.27.

Five Tests, 57 ODIs, 47 T20s, and 18 caps with the Australian football team is one mighty package.

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The icing on the cake being player-of-the-match in the World T20 Cup in 2010, where Australian beat New Zealand by three runs in the nail-biting final.

You have to go back to the 60s to find anywhere near the equivalent to Ellyse Perry.

Heather McKay won a phenomenal 16 successive British squash Opens from 1962 to 1977, but somehow managed to fit in two stints as a Hockeyroo in 1967 and 1971.

Mike Cleary was a Wallaby in 1961, a 100 track bronze medalist at the 1962 Perth Commonwealth Games and a Kangaroo the same year.

Dick Thornett was an Olympic water polo rep at the 1960 Rome Games, and a Wallaby in 1961.

And Brian Booth was a Australian Olympic hockey rep in 1956, but had to wait to become a Test cricketer until 1961.

So the PLC Pymble sports captain, as well as cricket and athletics captain in 2008 deserves far more recognition for her achievements in 2014.

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And, for that matter, so does women’s sport in general instead of being buried near the comics.

May Ellyse Perry be the flag-bearer, there couldn’t be a better one.

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