Melanie Jones (born 11 August 1972,

Barnstaple Barnstaple ( or ) is a river-port town and civil parish in the North Devon district of Devon, England. The town lies at the River Taw's lowest crossing point before the Bristol Channel. From the 14th century, it was licensed to export wool from ...

Devon Devon ( ; historically also known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel to the north, Somerset and Dorset to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Cornwall to the west ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

) is an English-born Australian cricket commentator and former

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

er who represented the

Australia women's national cricket team The Australian women's national cricket team, formerly known as the Southern Stars, represent Australia in international cricket. Currently captained by Alyssa Healy and coached by Shelley Nitschke, they are the top team in all world rankings ...

Early life

Jones was born in

and moved with her mother to

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

when she was three months old. Her father, a Trinidadian, stayed back in England. Although not meeting her father till the age of 16, he played a significant role in attracting her to cricket through his connection to the West Indian players of the 1970s and 1980s. Her Elwood Secondary College school development in Melbourne was nurtured by her geography teacher John Handscomb, the father of Australian Test player

Peter Handscomb Peter Stephen Patrick Handscomb (born 26 April 1991) is an Australian cricketer who plays for the Victoria cricket team. He plays as a middle-order batsman and occasional wicketkeeper. Handscomb has played for Australia in Test matches, One Da ...

Playing career

Starting her career as an opening bowler for Victoria and Australia U/21s, Jones then developed into a top order bat for the majority of her career. She played 5

Test matches Test match in some sports refers to a sporting contest between national representative teams and may refer to: * Test cricket * Indoor cricket, Test match (indoor cricket) * Test match (rugby union) * Test match (rugby league) * Test match (associa ...

for

between 1998 and 2003, scoring 251 runs, highlighted by a 131 on debut against England in August 1998. Jones was the 134th woman to play Test cricket for Australia. She also played 61

One Day International One Day International (ODI) is a format of cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of fifty overs, with the game lasting up to 7 hours. The World Cup, generally held every four yea ...

for Australia, scoring 1028 runs winning two World Cups in 1997 and 2005 and two successful women's Ashes campaigns in 1998 and 2002/3. While working in the development of women and girls' cricket for Surrey County Cricket Board Jones played for the Surrey County women's cricket team and coached their junior teams between 2003 and 2004. She played 122 games for the Victorian Spirit in the Australian

Women's National Cricket League The Women's National Cricket League (WNCL) is the national domestic 50-over competition for women's cricket in Australia. Featuring seven teams—one from every state, plus the Australian Capital Territory—each season's winner is awarded th ...

, and then five

Women's Twenty20 cricket Women's Twenty20 is the use of the Twenty20 match format in women's cricket. In a Twenty20 match, the two teams bat for a single innings each, of a maximum of 20 over (cricket), overs. The wider rules and playing conditions are usually the same ...

games for the Tasmanian Roar.

Commentary career

Missing an Australian Ashes tour to England in 2001, Jones was asked by Sky Sport to commentate on a ODI between the two teams. Subsequent work trips to England meant one off commentary stints with this leading to opportunities in Australia in 2007 with Channel 9 to cover the women's Twenty 20 internationals. Jones was then part of the ICC's first ever coverage of women's world cups in 2009 when she joined Alan Wilkins, Belinda Clark, Debbie Hockley, Danny Morrison and

Wasim Akram Wasim Akram (Punjabi language, Punjabi, ; born 3 June 1966) is a Pakistani cricket commentator, Coach (sport), coach, and former cricketer and captain (cricket), captain of the Pakistan national cricket team. Akram is regarded as one of the ...

. 2015 saw Jones, along with

Isa Guha Isa Tara Guha (born 21 May 1985) is an English sports television commentator and radio cricket broadcaster, and former England cricketer who played in the 2005 South Africa World Cup and the 2009 Australia World Cup.

Lisa Sthalekar Lisa Carprini Sthalekar (born 13 August 1979) is an Australian cricket commentator and former cricketer and captain of the Australia women's national cricket team. In domestic cricket, she represented New South Wales. She was a right-handed al ...

and Anjum Chopra, join the

Indian Premier League The Indian Premier League (IPL) is a professional Twenty20 (T20) cricket league in India, organised by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). Founded in 2007, it features ten city-based Professional sports league organization, fr ...

as the first women to commentate on the largest domestic cricket competition and top ten world sporting competitions. This led to joining Channel 10 in the inaugural season of the

Women's Big Bash League The Women's Big Bash League (WBBL) also known as Weber WBBL for sponsorship reasons, is the Australian professional Women's Twenty20 Cricket league. The WBBL replaced the Australian Women's Twenty20 Cup, which ran from the 2007–08 season ...

, and also provided boundary commentary during the 2015-16 Big Bash League, along with commentary in the Pakistan Super League in 2017. With a change to media rights in Australia in 2018 Jones departed her full time employment as a sports agent and joined the Fox Sports Cricket commentary team which included the first ever production of a women's cricket magazine show, The Blast, with co-host Megan Barnard. Jones has maintained her connection with Sky Sport Cricket and is a constant part of the England cricket summer across men's and women's Internationals and The Hundred. Commentary extended to radio stints with BBC, SEN and ABC and her own WBBL vodcast with comedian Bobby Macumber called Pitch Perfect. Now a regular on ICC men's and women's world cups and T20 world cups, Jones voice is synonymous with cricket commentary and world cup cricket moments as well as lending her voice for cricket games like the Ashes Cricket 17 game and various podcasts. Jones was part of the commentary panel for the

2025 ICC Champions Trophy The 2025 ICC Champions Trophy was the ninth edition of the ICC Champions Trophy. It was hosted by Pakistan Cricket Board from 19 February to 9 March 2025 and featured 15 matches held across three venues in Pakistan and one in the United Arab E ...

. and the

2025 ICC World Test Championship final The 2025 ICC World Test Championship final was a Test cricket match played at Lord's, London from 11 to 14 June to determine the winner of the 2023–2025 ICC World Test Championship. It was played between Australia and South Africa. South Afr ...

Personal life

Jones completed a Bachelor of Applied Science in Human Movement and a Graduate Diploma of Secondary Education teaching at Victoria University. After a short time as a Physical Education teacher she moved into cricket development and coaching for women and girls across Australia, UK, and South Africa. A career as a sports agent with TGI for some of Australia's leading female athletes was left upon taking up full time commentary in 2018. Jones is an ambassador with Australian charity, Red Dust, which promotes health initiatives in remote Aboriginal communities and is a Victoria University Women in Sport Ambassador. In 2017 Jones was inducted to the

Victorian Honour Roll of Women The Victorian Honour Roll of Women was established in 2001 to recognise the achievements of women from the Australian state of Victoria. It was launched by The Hon. Joan Kirner AC as a joint initiative of the Centenary of Federation Victoria Comm ...

, while in the

2019 Australia Day Honours The 2019 Australia Day Honours are appointments to various orders and honours to recognise and reward good works by Australian citizens. The list was announced on 26 January 2019 by the Governor General of Australia, Sir Peter Cosgrove. The Au ...

, Jones was awarded the

Order of Australia Medal The Order of Australia is an Australian honour that recognises Australian citizens and other persons for outstanding achievement and service. It was established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, on the advice of then ...

, for services to cricket and the community.

Cricket Victoria Cricket Victoria (CV) is the governing body for the sport of cricket in the Australian state of Victoria. It is integrated with the Victorian Women's Cricket Association to include funding, programs, office accommodation and staff assistance. ...

became the first Australian state to successfully nominate a woman to the board of Cricket Australia where Jones spent a term working through some of Australian cricket's biggest challenges including hosting T20 World Cups, responding to the covid pandemic and co-chairing the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island Cricket Advisory Committee..

References

Externallinks

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Mel Jones
at Southern Stars {{DEFAULTSORT:Jones, Mel 1972 births Living people Australia women Test cricketers Recipients of the Medal of the Order of Australia Australia women One Day International cricketers Women cricketers who made a century on Test debut English emigrants to Australia Australian people of Trinidad and Tobago descent English people of Trinidad and Tobago descent Sportspeople of Trinidad and Tobago descent English people of Australian descent Cricketers from Barnstaple Australian cricket commentators Women cricket commentators