Reigning Women’s National Cricket League champions Queensland have boosted their playing squad for the 2025-26 season with a quintet of rising talent signing on with the Fire.
With Cricket Australia contracting Grace Harris, Georgia Voll and Lucy Hamilton for the coming season, Queensland Cricket has moved to secure the next generation of Fire players.
The Fire will welcome three new players to its main playing squad, with two more first-time Rookie contracted players announced today.
Wests off-spinner Lilli Hamilton has recovered from knee injuries suffered during her season as a Rookie contracted player last year to receive a full contract.
Sunshine Cost pace bowler Catherine White and Wynnum-Manly batter Grace Collins, who made her WNCL debut last season, have received full contracts for the first time after being called up from outside the squad last summer.
Hamilton (Toowoomba), White (Childers) and Collins (Maryborough) have each progressed from regional centres via the Queensland Youth Pathway and Queensland Premier Cricket system.
Australian Under-19 duo Ayaka Kato-Stafford and Filippa SueSee have been signed to Rookie contracts for the first time.
Stafford, a 16-year-old leg-spinner, has represented Japan in four One Day Internationals, with her brother Kazuma Kato-Stafford a member of the Japanese side that contested the ICC Under-19 Men’s World Cup in Namibia and Zimbabwe earlier this year.
She played for the Brisbane Heat side in the women’s T20 Spring Challenge last season and toured Sri Lanka with the national Under-19 team. She also played in last month’s international U-19 Tri-series against England and Sri Lanka in Brisbane and on the Gold Coast.
Stafford, a member of the championship Queensland U16 and U-19 teams last summer, took 65 wickets at 18.05 across all matches and formats in 2025-26.
SueSee, 18, is a pace-bowling allrounder who also played for the Brisbane Heat in the T20 Spring Challenge series after finishing as the leading wicket-taker in the KFC T20 Max series.
She took nine wickets in five T20 and ODI matches for Australia in the recent U-19 Tri-Series as well as claiming 4-10 in the only warm-up game against England. In all formats last season, she took 52 wickets at 16.87.
Stafford and SueSee both play for Western Suburbs and attend Brisbane State High School.
Batter Laura Harris and allrounder Ruby Strange drop off the list, with Strange signing a contract with WA where she was a member of the Perth Scorchers squad in the WBBL last season.
QC General Manager - High Performance Bennett King acknowledged the contributions of the players who moved off the Fire list.
“We are grateful for the commitment that Laura and Ruby have made to the Queensland Fire in the past. On behalf of Queensland Cricket, we wish them every success for the future,’’ he said.
“It’s exciting to be able to welcome Grace, Catherine, Aya and Filippa into the squad for the first time as contracted players, and we’re pleased that Lilli has bounced back from untimely injury last season to be part of our list again this year.”
“Winning the Ruth Preddey Cup as WNCL champions for the second time was a significant achievement for the group and we look forward eagerly to the challenge of the coming season,” King said.
The Fire defeated NSW by seven runs in a gripping rain-affected WNCL Final at Cricket Central in Sydney, with captain Georgia Redmayne and Australian allrounder Grace Harris combining for a 192-run partnership.
Queensland’s score of 7-332 was a WNCL record, breaking the mark that the Fire had set in their win over Victoria in 2020-21.
Redmayne (105) scored her second century in a Final and became the first woman to score four centuries in a WNCL season.
Harris was player of the match for her sparkling 111 from 94 balls.
Cricket Australia Contracted – Queensland
Lucy Hamilton (Sunshine Coast)
Grace Harris (Wests)
Georgia Voll (Sandgate-Redcliffe)
2026-27 Queensland Fire Squad
Lily Bassingthwaighte (Wests)
Bonnie Berry (Valley)
Lucy Bourke (Valley)
Grace Collins (Wynnum-Manly) *
Sianna Ginger (Valley)
Lilli Hamilton (Wests) #
Nicola Hancock (UQ)
Jess Jonassen (Valley)
Charli Knott (UQ)
Annie O'Neil (Wests)
Grace Parsons (Wests)
Georgia Redmayne (Wests)
Catherine White (Sunshine Coast) *
Lauren Winfield-Hill (UK)
Mikayla Wrigley (Sunshine Coast)
*New to squad in 2026-27
#Promoted from 2025-26 Rookie list.
Qld Fire Rookies
Aya Stafford (Wests)
Filippa SueSee (Wests)
IN: Grace Collins, Lilli Hamilton, Catherine White, Aya Stafford, Filippa SueSee
OUT: Laura Harris, Ruby Strange (WA)