Merissa Ria Aguilleira (born 14 December 1985) is a Trinidadian former

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er who played as a right-handed

wicket-keeper The wicket-keeper in the sport of cricket is the player on the fielding side who stands behind the wicket or stumps being watchful of the batsman and ready to take a catch, stump the batsman out and run out a batsman when occasion arises. Th ...

batter Batter or batters may refer to: Common meanings * Batter (cooking), thin dough that can be easily poured into a pan * Batter (baseball), person whose turn it is to face the pitcher * Batter (cricket), a player who is currently batting * Batter ...

. She played for the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...

between 2008 and 2019, appearing in 112

One Day Internationals A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World Cu ...

and 95

Twenty20 Internationals A Twenty20 International (T20I) is a form of cricket, played between two of the international members of the International Cricket Council (ICC), in which each team faces a maximum of twenty overs. The matches have top-class status and are the ...

before announcing her retirement from international cricket in April 2019. She played domestic cricket for

Trinidad and Tobago Trinidad and Tobago (, ), officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean. Consisting of the main islands Trinidad and Tobago, and numerous much smaller islands, it is situated south of ...

Career

In 2007, she was named captain of

. Another role Merissa has is as the Sports Ambassador for Atlantic LNG. Aguillera captained the West Indies in the

2009 Women's Cricket World Cup The 2009 Women's Cricket World Cup was the ninth edition of the Women's Cricket World Cup, held in Australia from 7 to 22 March 2009. England won the tournament, beating New Zealand in the final to claim their third World Cup title. England batte ...

. A

wicket keeper The wicket-keeper in the sport of cricket is the player on the fielding side who stands behind the wicket or stumps being watchful of the batsman and ready to take a catch, stump the batsman out and run out a batsman when occasion arises. Th ...

and top order batsman, she has played 15

since making her début against the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

in 2008. In 2011, in Bangladesh, Aguilleira, along with the rest of the West Indies team, won ( ICC Women’s World Cup Qualifier) four-nation tournament. She and her team also played in the 50-over World Cup Final in 2013. They played against Australia and were defeated. Earlier in Merissa’s life, she went to Moruga Composite School where she played windball cricket. In 2015 Aguilleira was removed as captain when

Pakistan women's cricket team The Pakistan women's national cricket team, also known as Green Shirts or Women in Green, represents Pakistan in international women's cricket. One of eight teams competing in the ICC Women's Championship (the highest level of international wom ...

toured

, three days before they were announced as a new team. Jamaican’s

Stafanie Taylor Stafanie Roxann Taylor (born 11 June 1991) is a Jamaican cricketer who is a former captain of the West Indies women's cricket team. She has represented them over 250 times since her debut in 2008. A right-handed batter and off break bowler, Ta ...

replaced her. Aguilleira was captain of the West Indies from 2007-2015. While she was captain she took the team to the finals of the

2013 Women's Cricket World Cup The 2013 Women's Cricket World Cup was the tenth Women's Cricket World Cup, hosted by India for the third time, and held from 31 January to 17 February 2013. India previously hosted the World Cup in 1978 and 1997. Australia won the tournament for ...

and took the team to the semi-finals the last three Twenty20 World Cups. Aguilleira along with reserve players are a part of a squad that is currently in a training camp at the

West Indies High Performance Centre The West Indies High Performance Centre (WIHPC or just HPC) is a cricket academy and training centre based at the 3Ws Oval on the Cave Hill, Barbados, campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI). The centre was initially sponsored by the Sa ...

Barbados Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the Caribbean region of the Americas, and the most easterly of the Caribbean Islands. It occupies an area of and has a population of about 287,000 (2019 estimate). ...

. On 17 February 2013 West Indies were defeated by Australia by 114 runs in the finals. This was the ICC Women’s world cup at Barbourne Stadium. Also in 2013 Merissa Aguilleira was a nominee for Sportswoman of the Year at First Citizens Sports Foundation Awards ceremony, this was held at Queen's Hall. In 2016 Merissa Aguilleira and the rest of the

defeated

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

. This was in the semi-finals in the Women's ICC World Twenty20 in Mumbai, India. She holds the record for playing the most number of

WT20I Women's Twenty20 International (WT20I) is the shortest form of women's international cricket. A women's Twenty20 International is a 20 overs-per-side cricket match between two of the International Cricket Council (ICC) members. The first Twe ...

matches as captain who also has kept wicket (62 matches). In October 2018,

Cricket West Indies Cricket West Indies (CWI) is the governing body for cricket in the West Indies (a sporting confederation of over a dozen mainly English-speaking Caribbean countries and dependencies that once formed the British West Indies). It was originally ...

(CWI) awarded her a women's contract for the 2018–19 season. Later the same month, she was named in the West Indies' squad for the

2018 ICC Women's World Twenty20 The 2018 ICC Women's World Twenty20 was the sixth edition of the ICC Women's World Twenty20, hosted in the West Indies from 9 to 24 November 2018. It the second World Twenty20 hosted by the West Indies (after the 2010 edition), and the West Ind ...

tournament in the West Indies.

Outside of cricket

In 2002, alongside the Trinidad and Tobago Under-23's, Merissa played hardball cricket. Aguilleira is a part of the annual book drive in her community of Moruga. Doing this she partnered with Atlantic to help support the students in her community.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Aguilleira, Merissa 1985 births Living people Trinidad and Tobago women cricketers Trinidad and Tobago women cricket captains West Indian women cricketers West Indies women Twenty20 International cricketers West Indies women One Day International cricketers West Indian women cricket captains Wicket-keepers