{"id":444275,"date":"2026-01-29T03:20:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T03:20:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/444275\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T03:20:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T03:20:13","slug":"cricket-australia-announces-surprise-replacement-for-alyssa-healy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/444275\/","title":{"rendered":"Cricket Australia announces surprise replacement for Alyssa Healy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Victorian all-rounder Sophie Molineux has been elevated ahead of existing deputy Tahlia McGrath and is set to take the reins as Australia\u2019s new women\u2019s cricket captain in all three formats when Alyssa Healy retires following the upcoming Test and ODI series against India.<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cricket.com.au\/news\/4440717\/australia-captain-sophie-molineux-alyssa-healy-ashleigh-gardner-tahlia-mcgrath-india-squads-series-carey-schutt-king\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Cricket Australia<\/a> confirmed Molineux, 28, will captain the side for the first time during the three match T20 series against India beginning on February 15 with Tahlia McGrath and Ash Gardner announced as joint vice-captains.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a real honour to be named Australian captain and something I\u2019m incredibly proud of, especially following on from Alyssa, who\u2019s had such a huge impact on this team and the game,\u201d Molineux said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>MORE:\u00a0<a data-lead-article-link=\"\" target=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/au\/cricket\/news\/pat-cummins-stand-comedy-t20-world-cup-australia-amazon-primen\/9d5e94267c88b97ac272204b\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Pat Cummins preparing for T20 World Cup\u2014with stand up comedy<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve got a really strong group with plenty of natural leaders \u2026 I\u2019m excited to grow alongside this group of players and see what we can achieve together with Tahlia, Ash and the rest of the team,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<p>A left-arm orthodox bowling all-rounder, Molineux has played 52 matches for Australia since making her T20 and ODI international debuts in 2018\u2014and playing her first Test a year later.<\/p>\n<p>Molineux was chosen ahead of other strong candidates including McGrath, Gardner, Phoebe Litchfield and Annabel Sutherland, despite struggling with foot and knee injuries at times\u2014something acknowledged by Cricket Australia Head of Performance and National Selector, Shawn Flegler.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSophie is highly respected within Australian cricket, and her resilience, composure and proven domestic leadership makes her the right person to lead the team into a new era,\u201d Flegler said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe will continue to manage Sophie\u2019s workload, prioritising key tournaments and major international series following injury challenges in recent seasons.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Molineux has captained the Melbourne Renegades in the WBBL since 2021, and Victoria since 2022.<\/p>\n<p>Following the upcoming home India series, Molineux will lead Australia across all three formats for Australia\u2019s March tour of the West Indies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Victorian all-rounder Sophie Molineux has been elevated ahead of existing deputy Tahlia McGrath and is set to take&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":444276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-444275","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cricket","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-cricket","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}