Alex Griffiths is flying the flag for Wales

One of just four Welsh-born player involved in The Hundred, 19-year-old Alex Griffiths talks Western Storm, injury setbacks, and what it means to represent Welsh Fire

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Alex Griffiths is packing when she speaks to The Cricketer. It’s seven days before the start of The Hundred and in 24 hours, she’s heading to the team hotel where she’ll spend the next five weeks.

It’s been a long time coming for the 19-year-old, who was first offered a contract for the competition in January 2020. Her excitement, after 18 months of waiting, is palpable.

True, many of the players involved, both male and female, have faced a similarly agonising wait. However, for the Western Storm allrounder, the competition is of particular significance.

That’s because Alex Griffiths is one of only two Welsh-born players in the Welsh Fire camp, the other being Glamorgan allrounder, David Lloyd. In fact, if you expand the search area to include the remaining seven teams, that figure rises to just four, with Denbighshire-born Phil Salt (Manchester Originals), who earlier in July became the first Welshman to represent England since Simon Jones, and Neath-native Gwenan Davies (Birmingham Phoenix) getting in on the action.

But on July 27, three days after Welsh Fire’s opening match against Northern Superchargers at Headingley, Griffiths has the opportunity to step out in front of a home crowd at Sophia Gardens for the first time in her professional career. The first of four matches to be held a 45-minute drive from her home town club of Briton Ferry Steel near Port Talbot.

"We’ve never had anything down here really that’s promoted women’s cricket and for the girls to watch, so it’s a great opportunity," she says. "I hope people can see I’m a Welsh girl in Welsh Fire and I can fly the flag quite high. It’s great playing for Western Storm, but to have the Welsh flag and the Welsh Fire as a brand, it’s just nice to have some recognition this way."

Her entry into sport is a tale which will resonate with female players up and down the country: travelling the length and breadth of Wales to watch her elder brother play, initially bored before slowly but surely falling under cricket’s spell.

However, hailing from the South Wales coast where football and rugby rule the roost, her sporting career could easily have taken a different path. During primary school, she balanced cricket with football, playing as a central midfielder in the Swansea City academy before a successful trial for Cricket Wales’ Under-13s squad forced her to make a difficult decision.

"I had to stop playing football when I was 12 or 13 because cricket was too much of a commitment," she recalls. "I think it was an enjoyment thing, really. With cricket, you have more ups and downs, but it makes it more exciting. There’s just a bit more of a thrill to cricket. I do miss playing football though, but I think that’s just because I haven’t played for a while."

And her progression through the cricketing ranks has been swift. Representing Wales at every age-group level, Griffiths joined the Western Storm academy in 2016 before establishing herself as a first-team regular in 2020 following the restructuring of women’s domestic cricket. The then-18-year-old was ever-present for Storm in last season’s Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy, scoring 141 runs at a strike rate of 118.48 and taking three wickets – a haul which earned her both the Supporter’s Player of the Year gong and, more importantly, one of the club’s six professional contracts.

"It was nuts really, this year has been crazy," she admits, sounding a touch embarrassed after having her career achievements listed down the phone. "I think I was just taking everything in my own stride, playing my own game and trying not to worry about what was going on.

"We kind of knew [the season] was happening, so we were told to stay fit, and I was training as much as I could in my garden, but other than that, it was in at the deep end. But I was happy enough with the way it went!"

Unfortunately, her first off-season as a professional cricketer didn’t have such a happy ending. Participating in routine fielding practice ahead of an academy match for Western Storm, Griffiths suffered a grade three tear to her medial collateral ligament, which sidelined her for the first four rounds of Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy action. However, in characteristically upbeat fashion, she looks back on this injury, which briefly put her participation in The Hundred in jeopardy, with a glass half-full attitude.

^{Phil Salt, Gwenan Davies and David Lloyd}

"I was playing in an academy match… well I didn’t even play, it was in the warm-up, so that was brilliant," she laughs. "I was taking catches off the catching board and my knee buckled under me and I just went down. I though I’d dislocated my knee cap and I was like 'oh, that’s not good.' I was told to try and walk it off, but I couldn’t.

"That was quite a big blow at the start of the season but I’m lucky to have good support around me to get me back up and playing now. I mean, it’s frustrating to get injured at any time, whether it’s winter or any time, but I would have rather it happen when it did, rather than if it was now. I’d be out of The Hundred. You’ve got to try and take the positives."

Griffiths is now back to full fitness just in time to represent her home team in The Hundred, making three appearances in the Charlotte Edwards Cup to get her eye back in – another "in at the deep end" experience after a month on the physio’s bench.

Looking ahead to her time with Welsh Fire, Griffiths is looking forward to several things, including being a role model for young girls in South Wales – "it’s quite exciting really. I’m glad I’m in a position now where I can inspire young girls from similar areas and backgrounds to me" – and playing alongside former England wicketkeeper Sarah Taylor – "all of her experience in the women’s game and the men’s game. She’s got a lot of knowledge to pass on to people like me and the youngsters in the group."

However, most of all, she’s relishing the opportunity to play in front of a home crowd, including her family and friends from both Port Talbot and Cardiff Met, where she’s heading into the second year of her sports coaching degree.

"It’s been a long time coming with Covid, so it will be nice to get some crowds back in. Just having fans and support behind us in Cardiff, and my friends and family – I’m hoping they want to come!" she laughs.

But will she acknowledge her friends’ cheer squad or ignore them? "Probably the second one!"