It's been an exciting couple of months - Georgia Voll

UP Warriorz registered their second successive loss in the home leg, on Thursday, being outshone comfortably by Mumbai Indians, who overhauled the target of 151 with nine balls to spare. It was a result that has pushed Deepti Sharma's team almost out of contention for a playoff berth, but on the positive side though, they had one standout performer - Australia's Georgia Voll who joined the team a week ago as a replacement player for Chamari Athapaththu.

Voll, who had impressed earlier in the country during her stint with the national team, made her mark in the Women's Premier League in only her second-ever game. The hard-hitting all-rounder smashed a 33-ball 55, a knock which included 12 boundaries, to power Warriorz to a strong start. However, the rest of the batting order didn't offer enough support and the hosts were eventually limited to a below-par 150 for 9 eventually.

Nonetheless, Voll is excited that she was able to make an impression early in the competition. "It's been an exciting couple of months, something that I probably dreamed of and didn't expect to come so fast, Voll admitted. It's been a bit of a whirlwind couple of months and obviously to get the call to come over here to be a replacement was really exciting. I'm actually in the middle of renovating my apartment, so I've left that over to my dad and brother at the moment, so gets me out of doing that, which is great.

"I got the call on Saturday, sort of was just a waiting game to when I sort of left and obviously we had a state WNCL final, which was a bit disappointing to miss that, but yeah, super excited to get over here. Obviously, the first game was a bit disappointing in terms of not contributing to the team, but yeah, even though I did that today, it wasn't enough, unfortunately."

In what has been a change from UPW's plans from the first half of the tournament, for the first time this season, they played two overseas batters in the opening slot. The move seemed to have worked for a while even as Grace Harris couldn't find her rhythm, the middle order completely collapsed in trying to keep up with the strong start. Voll has backed her teammates to come good in the coming games.

"The players will be disappointed. Obviously, it's not their goal to go out there and not contribute to the team. Everyone's been working really hard at training, and it just hasn't sort of clicked yet, and we've got quite a young group, so moving forward, I think they'll be in good stead for the opportunities that they've had. Obviousl,y they're disappointed that they're not contributing to the team, but I think it's just around the corner."

Towards the end of Warriorz innings, Mumbai Indians were penalised for running behind on the over-rate. An upset Harmanpreet Kaur got into an argument with the umpire and when Warriorz batter Sophie Eccelestone tried to intervene, even she faced the ire of the Mumbai Indians' skipper.

Voll couldn't quite get what the frustration was about. "I was a bit of an angry aunt anyway, so it was actually quite funny to watch, but I think it was to do with the overrate. I don't think Harman was happy with having four (fielders) out, only allowing having three out. But they were about seven minutes behind, so I'm not really sure why she was mad at that."

Amelia Kerr, who was in the middle, elaborated on the incident in a bit more detail. "I was just trying to defuse the situation. Obviously, Harman and Sophie got a little bit heated out there. Both are very passionate cricketers and competitive and I'm a bit more laid back, so I was just having a bit of a joke with them both and trying to calm the situation.

"It just had to do with the overrate. We started the over, obviously we were too slow, and she was just asking why we couldn't start the over earlier because we were ready and we were waiting. But it did show on the clock that we were behind time. So that's something that we've got to get better at as a team because later on in the competition, if you have three out at the end, it can be a real advantage to the batting side. So we've got to try and find ways where we can be quicker, and that's not Harman's responsibility, that's us as a team because she's got so much to focus on. We've got to be quicker between the overs as a fielding group."

Kerr, who had led the Warriorz collapse with a five-wicket haul then went on to open the innings for Mumbai Indians. It was the first time in three seasons that she had taken that slot, and even as she managed to score only 10 runs in 13 balls, there could be a possibility of seeing her higher up in the batting position more often.

"It was nice to get the opportunity to open the batting. It didn't come off, but for New Zealand and other teams around the world, I bat three, so it's similar, I guess, to opening. Just to get Yastika and have a left-hander in the middle order...So yes, we'll see what happens, but it's a nice little opportunity."