Calmore Sports’ very own Eve O’Neill was the star of the show as Hampshire’s Women kicked off their ECB County Championship campaign with a 35-run victory over a strong Sussex side in Brighton – but the victory was in no small measure down to Eve’s efforts!

Having seen her side finish on 115-6 from their 20 overs on a slow, damp wicket, 14-year-old spinner Eve was brought into the attack in the eighth over of the chase.

With the first ball of her second over – the tenth of the innings – Sussex’s overseas star Nicole Faltum, who had played all 14 WBBL games for Melbourne Stars in the winter, attempted a big shot and skewed to Caitlin Chissell.

Eve’s next scalp was regular Southern Vipers opener Ella McCaughan, deceived and dismissed for 11 off 32 balls – she faced nine balls from Eve and scored only two, the last of her deliveries seeing her caught by Gemma Lane.  At this point, Eve held figures of 2.2-0-4-2.

Georgia Adams did manage to get her away for a boundary late in Eve’s third over but she would return in the 16th and first remove the Southern Vipers captain, nicely taken by Bella Mitchell and then another high quality player in the orange and black, fellow spinner Nancy Harman was stumped by a beauty of a delivery which fizzed past her outside edge two balls later.

Eve would finish with sensational figures of 4-0-13-4 – the best ever figures by a Hampshire Women’s player on debut and the first to claim four wickets on doing so.  The previous best was Providence Cowdrill’s 3-7 against Devon at Cove in 2015.

It wasn’t quite to be back-to-back victories for the Hampshire side as they fell to defeat in the second T20 match of the day, although Eve did return figures of 3-0-9-0 – another excellent economical spell and a single with the bat.

All in all, an outstanding debut for Eve, in front of very proud parents and on-looking Southern Vipers management and coaches, including Charlotte Edwards and Adam Carty.

The future is very bright for a very fine and dedicated player.  Well done Eve!