The Analysis: Bess Heath lights up Northern Superchargers' star-studded top order

NICK FRIEND: It's an exciting time for English batting, with a commitment to a gung-ho approach in the shortest format opening the door to players like this

New Zealand know all about Bess Heath.

Under a month ago, she strode out to face the third ball of a warmup game ahead of the Commonwealth Games, drafted in by England A as a prototype of the kind of uber-aggression sought by Lisa Keightley and Heather Knight in their T20 unit.

She smashed 84 off 51 balls, including 24 off a single over from Sophie Devine. Two sixes were bludgeoned over the legside, and she reverse-swept at will. She swept her fourth ball for four and had found the boundary eight times by the end of the powerplay.

A wicketkeeper by trade, it's her pinch-hitting that is getting her noticed.

Bryony Smith was recalled by England on a similar basis earlier this summer, with the No.3 role now effectively considered a free hit to either carry on the momentum of the openers or take on the fielding restrictions after an early wicket.

Alice Capsey played the part to perfection in Oval Invincibles' win over Northern Superchargers on women's competition's opening night, with Heath merely a spectator in the outfield, watching presumably with a sense of self-recognition. Even the game-ending stroke – a reverse-sweep helped over backward point – was straight out of Heath's playbook.

It's an exciting time for English batting, with a commitment to a gung-ho approach in the shortest format opening the door to players like this. Marie Kelly is another who can't be far aaway: in the second fixture against New Zealand, she took on Heath's mantle and belted 89 off 59 deliveries. Only Lauren Winfield-Hill and Danni Wyatt had a higher strike rate in this year's Charlotte Edwards Cup.

^{Northern Superchargers won a tight game at Headingley (Ashley Allen/Getty Images)}

Heath wouldn't be playing for Northern Superchargers without this niche: Alyssa Healy has the gloves, so her solitary currency has to be runs. She will learn plenty from the next month, squeezed into a big-name top order acquired from around the world – Healy, Jemimah Rodrigues and Laura Wolvaardt – that she propped up at Headingley, making 57 off 34 balls, the third-highest score by an uncapped player in the history of the women's tournament.

"We decided that it was for me to take it on," she put it afterwards. Her captain, Hollie Armitage, called her "someone to look for in the future England-wise".

Superchargers' decision to stack the batting, however, means they'll need to rack up bigger totals than they have managed in their first two games to justify that strategy.

Beth Langston, Jenny Gunn, Linsey Smith and Alice Davidson-Richards represent the extent of international pedigree in their bowling, but it has been a long time since Langston, Gunn or Smith played for England, while bowling is Davidson-Richards's second skill.

What they might lack in stardom, though, they made up for in experience. Davidson-Richards went at a run a ball through her 20 and was excellent at the death, while Katie Levick's leg-spin was used more sparingly but only accounted for eight runs in 10 deliveries.

^{Heath and Laura Wolvaardt put together an important stand (Ashley Allen/Getty Images)}

The result ought to have been a cakewalk for Beth Mooney, perhaps quietly the leading T20 batter in the game – player of the tournament at the most recent T20 World Cup and the highest-ever run-scorer in the Women's Big Bash.

She made intelligent use of a parched outfield, simply playing traditional cricket shots in marked contrast to Heath's earlier blaze until a poor runout brought about her first dismissal of the competition and opened the game to the hosts.

In truth, they missed someone like Heath to break the game open thereafter, chasing a total that Heath herself thought to be "15 to 20" runs under par. Sophie Luff, who had earlier dropped two catches, controlled the innings but took a while to get going, while Danielle Gibson, Naomi Dattani and Alice Monaghan between them contributed nine runs in 13 deliveries.

Fittingly, it was Heath who caught Charlie Dean to all but clinch victory, with Nat Wraith unable to hit the final ball of the match for the six required to steal a tie for Spirit, who have now lost twice.