The national women's cricket team, the Capricorn Eagles, travelled to the Middle East on Saturday where they will compete in the Dubai T20 International League.

The team were sent off Friday on their international tour, which will see the Capricorn Eagles playing six T20I matches against the United Arab Emirates. Head coach Francois Van Der Merwe says he is looking forward to playing in unknown conditions.

This will be the first time the team will be playing in the the Middle East and the coach says that although the playing conditions will be different to what they are used to, they have prepared the players accordingly.

The captain of the Eagles, Irene van Zyl, says the preparations have been coming along quite well over the past few months and that they have also been running a lot in the heat and spent time in saunas to get used the the weather conditions they will face on their tour.

The Capricorn Eagles will be using the Dubai tournament as part of their preparations for the upcoming World Cup qualifiers in December.