With the tournament set to begin in the autumn, England concluded their summer with a 2-1 one-day international series defeat against India at Chester-Le-Street after losing by 13 runs, thanks to a brilliant effort with the bat from Harmanpreet Kaur.
The India captain smashed 102 off 84 balls and a half-century from Jemimah Rodrigues – along with scores of 45 from Smriti Mandhana and Harleen Deol – helped the visitors reach 318 for five.
Nat Sciver-Brunt and Emma Lamb led the recovery effort for the hosts with a mammoth 162-run partnership, but a quick loss of four wickets in the final five overs saw India ease to victory.
England’s next target is the World Cup, where they play their opening game against South Africa in October and Edwards insisted her side were going to the tournament to “really compete”.
Asked what success would look like at the tournament, Edwards replied: “We’re going there to win it, clearly, because any team I’m sure me and Nat are part of, we want to win.
“Getting to the final would be a real success for us, but that’s obviously a long way off.
“We’re certainly going there to really compete and we believe we’ve got a team that can really compete.
“I know you guys haven’t seen the results from us in this series that you would’ve liked, but we know in our dressing room what we’re doing and how we’re progressing.
“That’s the most important thing to me, if I’m honest, we’re really progressing and improving. I can see real progress with this group.”
England have faced criticism since their 16-0 Ashes whitewash at the start of the year, which led to the appointment of Edwards and Nat Sciver-Brunt as captain.
The first summer in their new roles saw a clean sweep in their white-ball series against the West Indies followed by a T20 and ODI series defeat to India.
One area that continues to be questioned is their fielding displays over the course of the summer and Edwards admitted that while there had been lessons learned, her side were “out-fielded” by India.
“I think a brilliant series to be part of, I thought there were three excellent games of cricket where we’ve been tested,” she said.
“We’ve had really close games of cricket. I’ve seen us against one of the best teams in the world and positives have been around our batting.
“How we’ve performed with the bat over this series has followed on from the West Indies series.
“I think India have been exceptional, they’ve been really disciplined with the ball and I think it’s something we can really learn from.
“I think they’ve out-fielded us, hence why they’ve lifted the trophy today and we haven’t.
“Certainly from every player and fans that have been watching it, it’s been a great series to view and we’ve certainly learned a lot about our squad over the last two or three weeks.”
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