Tammy Beaumont can still remember crying on the Lord’s balcony, wondering if all the sacrifices were worth it. Wondering whether she was even good enough. England had just been beaten by Australia in the first ODI of the 2013 Ashes and another opportunity had passed her by. Coming in at No 6 with the match on the line, she was dismissed cheaply and watched her team slip to a narrow defeat. This was Beaumont’s 51st appearance for England, and she was yet to reach 50 in any format.
“I thought: ‘If we don’t win this game I’m getting dropped again’,” says Beaumont. “After the game I disappeared out of the changing room and cried on the benches. The assistant coach Carl Crowe came out to find me and I was sobbing. I was a really ugly crier back then, it was pretty gross! I asked him, ‘Should I just give up?’” Crowe advised Beaumont to take a short break from the game to consider her future. “He said: ‘If you do want to carry on, you need to work out what it is you want to achieve’.”
A month later they met for a coffee and Beaumont sheepishly admitted her ambition was to become the best opening batter in the world. Given her record it felt far-fetched, but they put a plan in place that would ultimately reach fruition when Mark Robinson took over as head coach in 2016.
As Robinson scanned video footage of possible contenders shortly after his appointment, the crispness and power of Beaumont’s strokes immediately caught his eye. “He had to push hard to get me an opportunity,” says Beaumont, who, despite receiving one of the first 18 England women’s central contracts in 2014, had spent two years in “the wilderness” before being recalled for the 2016 T20 World Cup.
When Robinson sprang a surprise by effectively calling time on Charlotte Edwards’ England career in the aftermath of that tournament, Beaumont was recalled to the ODI side and asked to open the batting, reeling off scores of 70, 104 and 168* against Pakistan in her first series back and playing with new freedom and confidence. Suddenly her goal of becoming a world-leading opener didn’t feel so outlandish.
By the conclusion of the epochal 2017 World Cup, in which she finished as leading run-scorer and was named player of the tournament, Beaumont had nudged herself into the top bracket and now, as she prepares for her third 50-over World Cup, with 12 ODI tons under her belt (only Meg Lanning and Suzie Bates have made more), she ranks as one of the format’s all-timers.
At 34, she concedes this is probably her final 50-over World Cup. With Heather Knight and Danni Wyatt-Hodge the same age, and Nat Sciver-Brunt just a year younger, the tournament could mark the break-up of a quartet which has been the spine of England’s batting for the last decade. “I don’t want to call it my last World Cup, but it probably will be. This is my 16th year playing for England and everything has to come to an end. As a 50-over team, it’s probably the last time it will look like this.”
Having debuted for England as an 18-year-old in 2009, Beaumont is part of the last generation of players who straddle the amateur era, who pursued a career in the game when, in terms of being financially viable, there was really no career to be had. It makes her determination to battle through those lean early years all the more impressive. “I wanted to be the best and I wanted to represent England,” she says. “You could offer me the world to play franchise cricket, but I’m going to choose my country. That is literally everything I wanted to do.
“Before we were professional we used to have a dinner once a year with the England men’s team and sponsors, and an England cricketer from a while back once said: ‘Why do you bother when you don’t get paid for it?’ I just couldn’t believe it. Even now, I’d play for free. If I could financially afford it, I’d do it. For me the motivation is nothing to do with money.”
Beaumont’s experiences of the amateur era have given her a broad perspective on the game. She is studying for a Master’s in leadership in sport, and it’s clear she thinks deeply about cricket and its wider impact. She wants women’s cricket to retain the “accessibility and warmth” that characterised its non-professional years but says an increasingly toxic environment makes that challenging.
“We’ve got to keep sharing our characters and stories but, at the same time, we have to protect ourselves. Media scrutiny is part and parcel of professionalism. What I struggle with at times, and it’s not dealt with properly, is abuse online. That’s gone through the roof in the last couple of years. We’re still trying to build brands and grow the game and interact with fans online but, for me, I’m like, absolutely not. I want none of it. It’s gone from social media being a tool for the good of the game to now where it’s just constant abuse. Some of the stuff that my teammates got in The Hundred, as well as myself, was utterly disgusting. Racist, horrendous, sexist stuff. Horrific. And nothing is really done about it.
“I was ready to go to war and start my own campaign but I just don’t have the time or the energy. I also think it’s a battle you can’t win unless the social media platforms are going to listen. Maybe when I’ve got more time I could get together with some other women in sport who have experienced similar things and try to tackle it, but I’ve got a bigger battle with a World Cup around the corner.”
Beaumont’s recent form has given her plenty to think about before the World Cup. After starting the summer with a brace of ODI tons against West Indies and impressive domestic returns for The Blaze, she failed to make a statement score in July’s ODI series defeat to India and endured a miserable Hundred, averaging 11.75 across the tournament and captaining Welsh Fire to the wooden spoon. Back spasms didn’t help, and she admits she was burnt out by the tournament’s relentless schedule.
“By the end of that I needed some time away, so I put my bat in the garage for a week, to refresh the mental side of things. But I’m never too worried about form. During the Ashes I felt a million dollars in the nets and I couldn’t get past the opening bowlers. Other times I’ve felt scratchy as hell and scored hundreds. For me, ‘form’ is not necessarily a thing. In 50-over cricket there’s always time to grind out an innings and find a way. Then all of a sudden you middle one and you’re back.”
England prepared for the World Cup with a training camp in Abu Dhabi and warm-up games against India and Australia before their tournament opener against South Africa in Guwahati on Friday. With the Edwards/Sciver-Brunt regime making a stuttering start this summer, suffering ODI and T20I series defeat to India after whitewashing West Indies (who failed to qualify for the World Cup), England will begin as underdogs, with Australia and co-hosts India strong favourites.
“It wasn’t the ideal summer,” concedes Beaumont. “But in a way it has given us a really clear idea of where we need to get to. It’s a good little wake-up call. Quite often if you go into a tournament unbeaten for however long, once you come up against the tougher teams maybe you’re not quite on the mark. Lottie has made no bones about it. She’s here to win. Having known her since I was 13 years old, it’s how she played the game, but in her coaching she’s got a lot of perspective as well in terms of how she manages things. She’s also someone who really looks to the future. It’s not just short-termism.”
This will be the first World Cup since 2016 in which England aren’t captained by Heather Knight, and it’s been a baptism of fire for her successor Sciver-Brunt since her appointment in April. “It’s been tough for Nat,” says Beaumont. “She became a new mum, became England captain and then got injured. She’s had a lot of rehab to do, trying to get back bowling, so the best is yet to come from Nat’s captaincy.
“It’s really exciting how she can lead the team. She’s incredibly calm and, going into World Cups, that’s what you need. Very little seems to faze her, and it’s certainly had no effect on her batting – the way she batted up at Durham [when she made 98 in a losing cause against India] was outstanding and showed everyone how we want to go about it.”
Sciver-Brunt’s record in 50-over World Cups is exceptionally good (she averages 57.50 overall and 286 versus Australia, against whom she made one of the great centuries in a losing cause in the 2022 final in Christchurch). If England are to claim a first global trophy since their 2017 triumph, a huge burden rests on their skipper and the rest of the old guard, with Alice Capsey and Sophia Dunkley so far failing to live up to their promise and Emma Lamb only now beginning to replicate her domestic form on the international stage.
If this is to be a last World Cup hurrah, Beaumont is determined to go out in style, and she’s seen enough in her career to know the game can throw up a surprise when you least expect it.
“There’s no way you want to go into it thinking winning is unachievable. Tournament cricket is incredible. Last year New Zealand didn’t win a match for about 12 games in T20 cricket and then won a world tournament. A lot of people will say it’s too soon for us, and that after the summer we’ve had we’ve not got a great chance, but as players we have full belief in each other and all the staff. On our day, if we play our best cricket, we can definitely beat any team in the world.”
This is an article from Wisden Cricket Monthly. Click here to get more than 50% off an annual digital subscription.
