As Lauren Filer turns away in her follow-through after sending the ball whistling past a batter’s helmet, she cannot help but let out a small grin.
Fast bowlers have traditionally been three things: big, scary and mean, but with a new generation comes change. Mitchell Johnson was called the “smiling assassin” for his demeanour on the field but it had no effect on his lethal ability with the ball. Yet Filer has been encouraged to develop a ruthless streak.
“Lottie [Charlotte Edwards, England head coach] told me I need to stop smiling after bowling bouncers,” Filer tells Telegraph Sport with yet another grin. “She says, ‘It just loses its effect’. So I’m someone that likes to scare people and likes to be mean, but I probably won’t show it with my face. I would say my bowling doesn’t really represent my personality.”
Filer’s personality off the field might have more in common with her mostly well-behaved golden retriever, but on it she is targeting something else: the coveted 80mph barrier.
Only one woman has been verified at hitting speeds of 80mph – South African Shabnim Ismail. Australia’s Ellyse Perry has been clocked at that speed too, but there were doubts over the accuracy of the speed gun. It has never been done by an Englishwoman or in international cricket.
“I’ve always said it’d be great to hit it,” Filer says. “But I want to get faster more consistently. It’s not necessarily about a certain mark or anything like that, it’s trying to be as consistent as possible with my speeds.”
In March 2024, Ismail bowled the fastest recorded delivery in women’s cricket in the Women’s Premier League match for the Mumbai Indians. The speed gun read 132.1kmh (82.1 mph) and although the South African was nonchalant about it, saying she did not watch the speeds while she was bowling, it was a milestone in the women’s game.
Filer’s England team-mate Issy Wong spoke a few years ago about her desire to become the first bowler to break that barrier. For Filer it is tantalisingly close. She was twice clocked at 79mph during her fourth over in the third T20 of last summer against India, although she is critical of her performance on that occasion.
“Last summer they [the speeds] were very up and down,” she says. “Being consistently quick at that pace in the women’s game can be really effective and that’s what I want to do with my game.”
It is why she has spent the last few months tinkering with an element of her bowling routine. While the women’s cricketing calendar is not yet as demanding as the men’s, there are increasingly fewer gaps for players to find the time to work on their game. However, a rare opportunity came up this winter as England did not play between their defeat in the World Cup semi-final on October 29 and early May the following year.
“I have had a little change with my run-up,” Filer explains. “We don’t get a lot of time to do any sort of technical changes with our calendar, so it’s been nice to strip it back and try to look at stuff I can be more efficient with or
try to improve myself.”
Like England paceman Mark Wood, Filer has a follow-through that often causes her to take a tumble on to the turf. It has been described as a cause for concern, but her desire to tweak her run-up is not because of the falls. Instead, she has looked to limit side rotation to reduce the pressure on her back with a hope that this summer she can capitalise on the improvements.
“I’ve always wanted to be an impact player and try to do something that not many people can do,” Filer says. “I want to try to get better at the death and be an option for Nat [Sciver-Brunt] at that time, it’s something I still want to develop.
“Having something that not a lot of people do is a super weapon, but it also can be a little bit detrimental, because if you don’t feel like you’re doing it, it can be quite hard.”
The last time she made substantial changes to her action it had a dramatic effect. In 2022, she had just graduated with a degree in sports science from Cardiff Metropolitan University, but struggled in the second edition of the Hundred.
During the tournament, Filer missed so many shifts at Tesco that she lost her job, but that autumn she became a fully professional cricketer for the first time, when she was among the cohort given deals at Western Storm.
Over the following winter, she remodelled her action under the guidance of England and Somerset coaches and shocked then-England captain Heather Knight in practice with her new-found pace. A year later she was bowling in front of 10,000 fans in a Test match at Trent Bridge.
Now she is established on the international circuit, and this year will have the chance to play in her first T20 World Cup, with an action that could bring even more explosive power.
“The last T20 World Cup I was out with the girls preparing and then obviously ended up coming home, which was quite tough to deal with. Hopefully if I get picked, it’ll be a great opportunity,” Filer says.
In 2024, Filer was part of the pre-tournament training camp in Abu Dhabi but not in the final 15 for the competition, with Jon Lewis selecting all-rounders Freya Kemp and Danielle Gibson as the additional pace-bowling options to Lauren Bell. The decision was made in part because of the original plan to host the tournament in Bangladesh, which would have been spin-friendly, and they chose not to change the side once it was moved to Dubai and Sharjah.