The male ruled cricket world saw, the rise of woman cricket when they set out to play World Cup. The first woman to hit the ball passing over the boundary in the air, Rachael Heyhoe Flint, rested in peace on Wednesday, at the age of 77.
Captaining the women’s team for England for about 12 years, she brought laurels to the team. Under her leadership, England won the inaugural Women’s Cricket World Cup, which took place two years prior to the Men’s Cricket World Cup.
Rachael became the first woman to have hit the first six in women’s Test match in 1963 at the Oval against Australia. Out of her three Test centuries, the highest was 179, which she scored against Australia, also at the Oval in 1976. She captained first England women’s team to play at Lord’s in Women’s Ashes series, 1976.
Rachael played in 22 Test cricket matches, with a batting average of 45.54 in 38 innings. As a right-arm leg spin bowler, she also had a bowling average of 68.
Heyhoe ended her cricket life in 1982. Rachael became a honorary life member of MCC in 1999, one of first ten women to get it. She became a director of Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. in 1997. The same year, she was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant of the West Midlands. In 2004, she became the first woman elected to the full committee of the MCC.
Appointed the Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2008, she was also inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame. Thereby she became the first woman to achieve this accolade. In November 2010, she was ennobled to sit in the House of Lords as a Conservative Party peer. In 2011, she took the title Baroness Heyhoe Flint, of Wolverhampton.
She also played for the England national field hockey as a goalkeeper and was a single-figure handicap golfer.
Rachael was born on 11 June 1939, at Wolverhampton, England. She married Derrick Flint, a cricketer. She had a son Ben, and step-children Simon, Hazel and Rowan Flint.
On 18 January, 2017, Lord’s announced the sad demise of Rachael Heyhoe Flint. The MCC lowered the flag to half-mast on the Clock Tower at Lord’s, as a mark of respect.
