 and a home multi-format Ashes. The other players to receive their first deals are exciting fast bowlers Lauren Bell and Issy Wong, opening batter Emma Lamb, and spin-bowling all-rounder Charlie Dean. The six players to lose their deals are Anya Shrubsole and Fran Wilson, who have retired from the international game, plus Lauren Winfield-Hill, Georgia Elwiss, Katie George and Mady Villiers. They will all drop down to regional deals, thus retaining their status as professionals, a stark improvement on the situation in recent years. Tash Farrant keeps her deal having spent much of the year sidelined with a stress fracture of the back, while Katherine Brunt now holds hers as a white-ball specialist having retired from Tests. Director of England women's cricket Jonathan Finch said the inclusion of new players 'is exciting and provides a new look and feel to the group'. Finch is currently leading England's search for a new Head Coach, after Lisa Keightley returned to Australia at the end of the season. An appointment expected in the middle of next month. The former Surrey player Jon Batty and Australia's Salliann Beams have been tipped for the role, and confusingly, there are two potential candidates named Jon Lewis: the former Durham head coach who has worked with England women in recent years, and the former England seamer. He has been){kind=link}
Lauren Bell, Issy Wong, Emma Lamb and Charlie Dean also offered central contracts for the first time
A changing of the guard in England women’s cricket has been signalled by the handing of a first central contract to six players, including teenagers Alice Capsey and Freya Kemp.
The England and Wales Cricket Board have dished out 18 national contracts which, alongside their 80 deals for regional players, means there will be at least 98 professional women’s cricketers in the country next summer. The eight regions could yet fund further contracts themselves.
Capsey, 18, and Kemp, 17, made their debuts for England this summer and earn their first national deals for a year in which they compete in a T20 World Cup (in South Africa in February) and a home multi-format Ashes.
The other players to receive their first deals are exciting fast bowlers Lauren Bell and Issy Wong, opening batter Emma Lamb, and spin-bowling all-rounder Charlie Dean.