Star-Studded MI Team Gives Me Freedom To Express Myself: Hayley Matthews

Hayley Matthews feels extremely liberated that Mumbai Indians' batting depth has allowed her to go hell for leather from the onset as she has done in both the WPL games so far. Opening the innings for MI, the 24-year-old from Barbados scored 47 off 31 balls in the opening game against Gujarat Giants and followed it up with a match-winning unbeaten 77 off 38 balls along with three wickets in her team's emphatic nine wicket win against Royal Challengers Bangalore. "We have got a team of a lot of stars. It has probably given the freedom at the top of the order here to go out there and bat," said Matthews, who hit 13 fours and a six during MI's chase of 156.

In fact Matthews said that playing on better batting tracks at the DY Patil and Brabourne Stadium has certainly helped her game a lot after having played on slow tracks in South Africa during T20 World Cup.

"Over the last couple of weeks for the West Indies, I've been working on my batting, getting the big scores. I have just tried to carry that (form) here. Also, batting on much better wickets here than what we got in South Africa has also helped. It has also got the confidence up as well," she added.

Matthews feels that on a batting belter like one at the Brabourne Stadium, a target of 175 to 180 is highly chaseable.

"It was a really good wicket to bat on. Probably 170 or 180 plus was the at par score. We have the batting and I think both me and Nat (Sciver-Brunt) were able to do that and secure a very good win," she said.

She also did her star turn with the ball and believes that her team's biggest USP is having lot of multi-skilled players at its disposal.

"Thankfully, they picked me as an all-rounder, so I expect them to toss me the ball here and there. We have got