The 1988 Shell Bicentennial Women's World Cup was an international

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

tournament played in Australia from 29 November to 18 December 1988. Hosted by Australia for the first time, as part of the Bicentenary celebrations, it was the fourth edition of the

Women's Cricket World Cup The Women's Cricket World Cup is the quadrennial international championship of Women's One Day International Cricket tournament. Matches are played as One Day Internationals over 50 overs per team. There is also another championship for Tw ...

, and came six years after the preceding 1982 World Cup in New Zealand. The tournament was organised by the International Women's Cricket Council (IWCC), with matches played over 60 overs.

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

won the tournament for a third consecutive time, defeating

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

in the final by eight wickets.

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

defeated

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

in the third-place playoff, while the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

, the only other team at the tournament, placed fifth and last after failing to win a single match. Both Ireland and the Netherlands were making their tournament debuts.

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

had been invited to compete, as they had at the previous two tournaments, but were forced to withdraw after failing to secure enough money from sponsors. Two Australians, Lindsay Reeler and Lyn Fullston, led the tournament in runs and wickets, respectively. The player of the series was English all-rounder Carole Hodges, who placed third for runs scored and second for wickets taken. She received a

Waterford Crystal Waterford Crystal is an Irish manufacturer of crystal glassware, especially cut glass products. It is named after the city of Waterford in Ireland. In January 2009, the main Waterford Crystal manufacturing base on the edge of Waterford was cl ...

trophy valued at A$4,000, donated by an Irish firm, R&A Bailey.

Squads

* Note: New Zealand's Nancy Williams dislocated her shoulder in one of the opening match, and was replaced by Catherine Campbell in the squad.

Venues

Warm-up matches

At least five warm-up matches were played against Australian state and invitational teams, which were interspersed throughout the tournament. ---- ---- ---- ----

Group stage

Points table

* Note:

run rate In cricket, the run rate (RR), or runs per over (RPO), is the average number of runs a batting side scores per over. It includes all runs made by the batting side in the innings to that point of the game, both the runs scored by the batsmen an ...

was to be used as a tiebreaker in the case of teams finishing on an equal number of points, rather than net run rate (as is now common).

Matches

1st Match

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2nd Match

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3rd Match

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4th Match

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5th Match

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6th Match

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7th Match

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8th Match

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9th Match

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10th Match

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11th Match

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12th Match

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13th Match

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14th Match

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15th Match

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16th Match

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17th Match

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18th Match

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19th Match

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20th Match

Finals

Third place play-off

Final

The final, held at the

Melbourne Cricket Ground The Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), also known locally as the 'G, is a sports stadium located in Yarra Park, Melbourne, Victoria. Founded and managed by the Melbourne Cricket Club, it is the largest stadium in the Southern Hemisphere, the Lis ...

, was broadcast live on radio and on ABC Television. It was attended by around 3,000 people, although the ground had a capacity at the time of over 90,000. Janette Brittin, who played for England in the match, later described the venue as having "wall-to-wall seating with no one sitting in them", making it "a very large and a very lonely place".Nishi Narayanan (8 March 2009)
"Like watching paint dry"
– ESPNcricinfo. Retrieved 29 August 2015. No women's cricket had been played there since 1949.

Statistics

Most runs

The top five runscorers are included in this table, ranked by runs scored and then by

batting average Batting average is a statistic in cricket, baseball, and softball that measures the performance of batters. The development of the baseball statistic was influenced by the cricket statistic. Cricket In cricket, a player's batting average is ...

. Source
CricketArchive

Most wickets

The top five wicket takers are listed in this table, ranked by wickets taken and then by

bowling average In cricket, a player's bowling average is the number of runs they have conceded per wicket taken. The lower the bowling average is, the better the bowler is performing. It is one of a number of statistics used to compare bowlers, commonly use ...

. Source
CricketArchive

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:World Cup 1988 1988 in women's cricket 1988 1988 in Australian cricket World Cup 1988 November 1988 sports events in Australia December 1988 sports events in Australia Australian bicentennial commemorations