Three sides contested the under 17 competition, with CAW and Wagga playing two T20 matches on Wednesday.

CAW also defeated Wangaratta on December 9.

At under 13 level, the CAW Stars and Thunder outfits joined Wangaratta.

“We think adding females to Country Week is a fantastic initiative and it’s definitely a part of our program going forward,” CAW chairman Michael Erdeljac said.

“And I’d like to thank (official) Catherine Wood for all the work she’s done, Catherine has been exceptional.”

The two grades form part of the eight divisions, which takes in teams from CAW, Wangaratta and Wagga associations.

The male teams, which range in age from under 12s to under 17s, play for five days and CAW is targeting a similar time frame for the females.

“The reason we’re only playing one day this year is because we’ve got to work out timetables to coincide with the North East Knights representative program,” Erdeljac said.

In the first T20 game, CAW posted 3-119.

NSW Country under 18 all-rounder Gabby Sutcliffe (Corowa) top-scored with 36, while Tooma’s Emily Lattanzio struck an unbeaten 34.

“Emily’s more of a big hitter, she was hitting more boundaries, but batted really well with Gabby, rotating the strike and both batted really positively,” coach Maddi Baird said.

“Gabby also batted really well, she hit the bad balls and respected the good balls, pushing for ones and twos.

“We were pretty happy, we said at the start we’re going to try and get a run a ball, around 120 would be a good score.”

Wagga was restricted to 8-75, with Howlong’s Olivia Baker grabbing 2-8.

“The girls were really good in the field, there weren’t too many misfields and they held most of their catches,” Baird said.

“The bowlers had good line and length, we had a few too many wides but we really improved on that in the second game.”

Baird is a fine player herself, playing provincial second grade with St Patrick’s.

At 19, the bowler says playing at a higher level has helped her enormously.

“It’s really improved my cricket, mentally and physically, so I hope it really helps the girls as well,” she said.

“Hopefully next year more girls and teams will be wanting to play, knowing there’s a rep comp around the region rather than having to play in Melbourne.

“I think that will really encourage more girls to play.”

CAW also won the second game, restricting Wagga to 5-74.

The home outfit cruised to an eight-wicket win with Sutcliffe blasting 38.