Shabnim Ismail – Bulletproof Truth

Nortjé’s absence conspicuous on CSA contract list

Only Kagiso Rabada has taken more test and ODI wickets during Anrich Nortjé’s career. Yet CSA have not contracted Nortjé.

Telford Vice / Cape Town

QUINTON de Kock, Dean Elgar, Sisanda Magala, Wayne Parnell and Keegan Petersen were not on the list of contracted men’s players CSA announced on Tuesday. Fair enough, in every instance. But the case of Anrich Nortjé, who also wasn’t named, raises questions.

De Kock, an all-format star until December 2021, now plays only T20Is. Test specialist Elgar has retired. Magala and Parnell each featured in only seven of South Africa’s 33 white-ball matches last year, and Petersen in just two of their four Tests.

Nortjé, also an all-format performer, appeared in only nine of those 37 games. But that was due to a lumbar stress fracture that kept him out of action from September 10 last year to March 7 this year.

At 30 he is in the prime of his career and among the fastest and most effective bowlers in the game. From his Test and ODI debuts in October and March 2019 only Kagiso Rabada has taken more wickets for South Africa in those formats, and none of Nortjé’s current teammates have a better T20I economy rate.

Nortjé returned to action in three matches for Eastern Province in the ongoing CSA T20 Challenge, the last two of them five days apart. He bowled all four of his overs in each game and kept a tidy enough economy rate of 6.83, and joined Delhi Capitals following the birth of his and his wife Micaela Nortjé’s first child last Tuesday.

If Nortjé is fit enough for most of what will be a gruelling IPL campaign — he missed Delhi’s first match on Saturday to be with his newly enlarged family — why isn’t he fit enough to be recontracted by CSA? Because, it seems, he wants to carefully manage the rest of his career.

Cricbuzz understands Nortjé has told CSA he wants to concentrate on T20 cricket — franchise and international — for most of this year before extending himself to ODIs by the end of 2024. That’s understandable for someone who missed the 2019 IPL and has been ruled out of the last two World Cups by injuries. Test cricket? We may have seen the last of Nortjé in whites. But, importantly, he has not retired from the international arena.

So the T20 World Cup in the Caribbean and the United States in June remains on his radar. The tournament is likely to be De Kock’s swansong in a South Africa shirt. That’s if he cracks the selectorial nod. De Kock scored a 44-ball 100 in a T20I against West Indies in Centurion in March last year, but in 24 subsequent innings in the format — for South Africa, Lucknow Super Giants, Melbourne Renegades and Durban’s Super Giants — he has passed 50 only twice, and been dismissed for three ducks and six other single-figure scores. He knows he has work to do to make the T20 World Cup squad.

Kyle Verreynne and David Bedingham could consider themselves unlucky not to be contracted. Verreynne scored consistently in the SA20 and the domestic first-class competition, and Bedingham’s 110 in Hamilton was among the few positives of South Africa’s Test series in New Zealand in February. Nandré Burger and Tony de Zorzi are the new faces among the 18 — down from last year’s 20 — who have landed contracts. There was good news for Andile Phehlukwayo, who is back in the centrally paid ranks despite playing for South Africa only six times in 2023.

There wasn’t as much to report from the women’s list, which increased by one to 16 players. Ayanda Hlubi and Eliz-Mari Marx have signed up and the only notable absence is that of Shabnim Ismail, who has retired.

CSA contracted players for 2024/25:

Men: Temba Bavuma, Nandré Burger, Gerald Coetzee, Tony de Zorzi, Bjorn Fortuin, Reeza Hendricks, Marco Jansen, Heinrich Klaasen, Keshav Maharaj, Aiden Markram, David Miller, Lungi Ngidi, Andile Phehlukwayo, Kagiso Rabada, Ryan Rickelton, Tabraiz Shamsi, Tristan Stubbs, Rassie van der Dussen.

Women: Anneke Bosch, Tazmin Brits, Nadine de Klerk, Lara Goodall, Ayanda Hlubi, Sinalo Jafta, Marizanne Kapp, Ayabonga Khaka, Masabata Klaas, Suné Luus, Eliz-Mari Marx, Nonkululeko Mlaba, Tumi Sekhukhune, Chloé Tryon, Delmi Tucker, Laura Wolvaardt.

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Transcendent Ismail pulls plug on international fire, fury and fun

“Dear cricket family.” – how Shabnim Ismail began her goodbye to the international stage.

Telford Vice / Cape Town

THE smile in Shabnim Ismail’s eyes gave her away on an enchanted evening under a bedouin canopy on a beach in Cape Town in February. Along with every player in the T20 World Cup, she was at the city government’s function thrown to welcome all involved in the tournament.

One of Ismail’s opponents walked in her direction. As the player was about to pass Ismail the South African caught her gaze and stuck out a leg in a mock attempt to trip her. The leg was quickly withdrawn and the two players shared a laugh. It was an insight into a quality Ismail isn’t often credited with: a mischievous sense of fun.

Far more often we have seen Ismail as the embodiment of the angry fast bowler; 1.65 metres and 60 kilogrammes of sheer ponytailed fury liable to lash out with gestures, facial expressions and verbally at opponents and teammates alike. And it worked. Like the rest of the best in her field she became more than the sum of her slight parts. So big that she was hardly challenged when she proclaimed herself “the fastest bowler in the world”. You want to argue with that? Good luck. Besides, she nailed down the numbers to support the hype.

Ismail is South Africa’s leading wicket-taker in both white-ball formats. But she transcended cricket in her country and became one of the all-time greats of the world game. Only Jhulan Goswami has taken more wickets in ODIs. Sixty-four more, but the Indian bowled 3,853 more deliveries. Two of the three bowlers behind Ismail have sent down more balls than she has. She is fourth among T20I wicket-takers.

Ismail was one of five debutants in an ODI in Laudium in January 2007. That August she featured in South Africa’s first T20I, against New Zealand in Taunton. She has been the heart and soul of South Africa’s attack for much of the ensuing 16 years.

On Wednesday she pulled the plug on all that by announcing her retirement from the international stage. That brings the number of caps worth of experience South Africa have lost from December 2022, or when Mignon du Preez retired, to 1,106. Du Preez has been followed into the sunset by Lizelle Lee, Dané van Niekerk, Trisha Chetty and now Ismail. Those five players account for more than a quarter of the places in the XIs of all the 380 matches South Africa have played across the formats in their history.

Debating who is the greatest among the famous five would be tedious, futile and hopelessly subjective. But there can be no discounting Ismail from that conversation, should we be churlish enough to want to have it. We should be satisfied to know she was central to the best game of cricket any senior South Africa team — male or female — have yet played, the T20 World Cup semifinal at Newlands in February.

Ismail breathed defiance in the face of heavily by dismissing Sophia Dunkley and Alice Capsey in the sixth over after Danni Wyatt and Dunkley had rattled up an opening stand of 53 off 31, and then bowling Heather Knight off her pads with three balls left in the match. The sight of Knight on one knee, head bowed, the toe of the bat she held in one hand resting lightly in sudden, shocked repose on the pitch, was a study in dignified defeat. It told of the truth that, on the day, South Africa were the better team. Ismail deserved much of the credit for establishing that fact.

So it says something that, despite her prima donna on-field persona, Ismail began her sign-off statement on Wednesday with “Dear cricket family”. There was more selflessness in her explaining her decision by saying she wanted to “spend more time with my family, particularly my siblings and parents as they get older”.

But she will keep the fast bowling fire burning in franchise leagues. Fresh from playing in the inaugural WPL in March, she is an established drawcard in the WBBL and the FairBreak tournament. Expect to see as much of her as her almost 35-year-old body will allow.

Her mind? That’s as sharp as ever. Its job, along with stoking the fire, is to keep finding the fun to put a smile in her eyes.

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The real South Africa stand up

“I didn’t even know how much I was defending.” – Shabnim Ismail on bowling the final over.

Telford Vice / Newlands

TO see representatives of three generations of men from one South African family hotfoot it along the pavement outside Newlands on Friday to get through the gates in time for the start of a women’s cricket match was to watch progress on the hoof.

They stopped for a handshake and a how are you, but their priority was as clear as their urgency. They had a T20 World Cup semifinal to watch, and their nervous enthusiasm and the Proteas shirts three of the four of them wore spoke of their commitment to that cause. So much so that not a word was exchanged about the men’s Test series against West Indies, under a new captain and coach, no less, that starts in Centurion on Tuesday.

It was also progress of a sort that a caterer at the ground would, almost 12 hours later at 3am on Saturday, be delivering food to the Atlantic Seaboard for the Formula E Grand Prix, which had snarled traffic to the extent that the journey by car from there to Newlands, which normally takes 20 minutes, dragged on for a gruelling hour.

Maybe Cape Town is becoming big enough to host more than one major event at a time, but the irony of hundreds of thousands of cars forcibly jammed bumper-to-bumper into narrow streets so that less than 3km of public roads could be turned into a private playground for a handful of wannabe F1 drivers and their battery-powered toys for two days wasn’t lost on anyone stuck in traffic.

All of which was forgotten as the sun started to sink over Table Mountain, because the survivors of the trudge and the hotfooters alike, and all of the 7,547 in attendance, had been rewarded for their efforts with an epic; a drama of swings, roundabouts and context rarely seen in any format, much less the shortest. And especially not in matches at the sharp end of tournaments that involve South Africa.

It isn’t fair to throw the women’s team into the mess made by their male counterparts, but that will happen nonetheless. South Africa’s women haven’t often choked, like their men have done too many times. Now the women must be recognised for having played the best game of cricket any team from their country have yet played. Fittingly, the prize for that achievement has taken them to a place no senior South Africa side had been despite reaching eight white-ball semis before Friday’s showdown: a World Cup final.

The South Africans’ six-run win over England, who had beaten them in three of their other five semifinals, was as astonishing as it was deserved. This was no accident caused by a wide here, a misfield there or a poor stroke somewhere else. It was a proper victory, earned through better batting, better bowling, better fielding, and better composure under pressure.

In some ways, it did not make sense. South Africa’s 164/4 was their best total of the tournament but only the seventh highest overall. Just eight times in their 139 other T20Is had they made a bigger score. They won all of those games, but they also totalled 164/4 against India in Potchefstroom in February 2018 — and lost by seven wickets with seven balls remaining. South Africa took 48 deliveries to reach 50 on Friday, England only 29. After 10 overs, South Africa were 67 for none. England were 84/2. South Africa reached three figures off 86 balls, 11 slower than England.

But the English had never successfully chased a higher score to win a T20 World Cup match. Only twice in all of their 87 previous T20Is in which they had fielded first had they hauled in a bigger target. Both times, Danni Wyatt scored a century. This time Wyatt was gone for 34, fooled by Ayabonga Khaka’s slower ball and taken at short fine leg by a slip-sliding Tazmin Brits — one of her world record-equalling four catches.

The best of them was a scrambling, low-as-her-laces grab at midwicket on the edge of the circle after Shabnim Ismail’s bouncer had left Alex Capsey nowhere to hide. Asked to explain, Brits said, “I was hoping you’re going to tell me how I happened to catch it, because I don’t know what happened there. My legs were so tired after batting. I just reacted and, yeah, it stuck.”

She didn’t look tired on a day the ball followed her everywhere. She also didn’t look like a former javelin junior world champion who had had to reinvent a career in sport after breaking her pelvis, dislocating her hip and bursting her bladder in a car crash. She looked like a cricketer; a damn good one.

But the rough and tumble has followed Brits across the boundary. She had to leave the field after taking the Wyatt catch to have her suddenly swollen forearm examined. “It was a vein that popped,” Brits said without a grimace. “It stood out but they pushed it down. We weren’t sure whether [the swelling] was a bone or not. I said to our physio, ‘Please let me go back on the field.’ He said, ‘No, let’s go sort this.’ I said I need to go onto the field. The doctor and him just checked and made sure there’s no bones broken.”

That was two balls after Brits had retreated to claim, above her head, the catch that removed Sophia Dunkley — South Africa’s first strike. Those two wickets fell in a fast, furious over in which Ismail moved the needle on the pace women are capable of generating. Told she had been clocked at 128 kilometres an hour, Ismail said: “No way! You guys are joking. I didn’t know that, but thanks for telling me. I loved it. I always speak about bowling as quick as I can.”

Brits had earned her keep by then. She shared an opening stand of 96 off 82 with Laura Wolvaardt that rendered England wicketless until the 14th over. Brits also put on 46 off 25 with Marizanne Kapp. Lauren Bell had Brits’ flat drive down the ground slickly caught by Katherine Sciver-Brunt, dismissing her for 68 off 55 in the 18th.

Often, South Africa’s bowlers do the winning. On Friday, the load was shared: the big total was followed by eight England wickets crashing for 100 runs. “The batters came to the party today,” Ismail said. “I loved the way they went about the game. As an attack, we knew we could defend anything.”

Brits concurred: “I’m scared when we start gelling, because we haven’t actually gelled as a unit. There’s either been good batters or good bowlers. We haven’t really clicked and we ended up making it to semi. I think today we almost clicked.”

With England needing 13 off the last and Heather Knight well set on 31 off 26, Suné Luus urgently waved Ismail in from the deep to bowl. Luus issued instructions staccato style, then backpedalled swiftly into the outfield to leave her champion fast bowler to get on with it. But 14 runs, one more than England’s remaining target, was how many Ismail had conceded in her previous over. “I didn’t even know how much I was defending,” Ismail said. “I wanted to go for between three and five runs.” She conceded six, and nailed Knight’s off-stump with her third delivery.

The end of the match left Charlie Dean distraught and on her haunches, her head bowed, her hands folded over her bat handle, at the Kelvin Grove End. She had to be fetched from that dark place by her batting partner, Sarah Glenn. The message from Knight will doubtless be, as England’s captain said more than once during her press conference, that “this match doesn’t define us”.

Brits arrived at her presser still in her spikes, which crunched loudly as she picked her way gingerly, clearly conscious of the noise she was making, across the 20 metres of wooden floor that separated the door through which she entered from the table where the microphones, cameras and reporters were primed. “Well,” she said as she sat down, “this is a new experience.”

How would she explain it all years from now? “I don’t know. I still can’t believe it. It feels like I’m still going to need to wake up.” Or keep dreaming. At least until Sunday’s final against Australia.

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The name’s Kapp. Marizanne Kapp …

“If we want to grow women’s cricket more Tests are needed, because it’s out there where you can try things and learn so much about yourself.” – Marizanne Kapp

Telford Vice | Cape Town

MARIZANNE Kapp doesn’t consider herself a Test player. She doesn’t see colour. She doesn’t enjoy multi-tasking. She doesn’t see why women shouldn’t be in whites at the highest level. If you need a myth busted, it doesn’t take much to see why you should give the job to South Africa’s premier allrounder.

Kapp spent almost four-and-a-half hours at the crease in Taunton on Monday facing 213 balls and scoring 150 — the best performance by a woman for South Africa and the best by a woman’s No. 6 — on the first day of the one-off Test against England. Her batting meant a first innings that had shambled to 45/4 when she took guard, and then slipped to 89/5, survived and prospered long enough to reach 284.

And yet, just last week, Kapp didn’t think she deserved a place in the XI. “I’ve been working hard on my white-ball game,” she told a press conference after stumps on Monday. “When I played that warm-up game the other day I was like, ‘I shouldn’t be playing Test cricket.’ Because I was playing a T20. If you forget about the colour of the ball that’s coming towards you, it helps a lot. If you focus too much on the ball and the fact that it’s a Test match you end up getting out. That’s the mistake I made in the warm-up game. I left balls that were there to drive.”

Kapp faced eight balls for a duck in the first innings against England A at Arundel Castle, and scored 34 off 28 in the second dig. It was the 485th match of a career that has spanned almost 18 years, but only her third game that involved a second innings. All of the others had been limited overs fixtures.

The paucity of red-ball cricket didn’t help Kapp prepare for her second Test, but it hasn’t stopped her from becoming a dependable player with bat and ball. Reluctantly, it seems: “At times it’s so difficult to focus on both bowling and batting; I feel like one always takes preference. But I’ve been working with some special coaches and the confidence is growing.”

Kapp was instrumental in South Africa reaching the semi-finals at the World Cup in New Zealand in March, when she scored 203 runs and took a dozen wickets in eight matches. She is ninth on the all-time list of wicket-takers in ODIs, behind only Shabnim Ismail among South Africans, and also second to Ismail in T20Is. But Kapp’s serious, calm presence on the field is at least as valuable as anything she does that keeps the scorers busy. That, she said, was part of her coping mechanism: “If I focus on the other batter it seems to take the pressure off me. That happened throughout the World Cup. When I give advice I forget the situation we are in and it helps me focus more.”

Kapp’s first experience of two-innings cricket was in an under-19 match between Eastern Province and Free State in Durban in December 2008. She took 4/8 and 3/5 in EP’s 89-run win. It would be almost another six years before she wore whites and played with a red ball — on her Test debut against India in Mysore in November 2014. She went wicketless for 27 in 16 overs and was trapped in front second ball by Rajeshwari Gayakwad. “My first Test was an absolute nightmare,” Kapp said.

Even so, she wasn’t put off the format: “You have to focus longer. It’s still cricket. Yes, it’s challenging. But if you take it ball by ball and session by session, it makes it easier.” Part of her motivation, no doubt, is the imperative to remind us that not only men play all forms of the game: “If we want to grow women’s cricket even more [women’s Tests are] definitely needed, because it’s out there where you can try things and learn so much about yourself. I would like to see women play more Tests. It will be good for the game.”

Good for the whole game, she didn’t have to say.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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South Africa to Van Niekerk: wish you were here

“We need to have a knockout mindset now; that next game against South Africa is crucial to our World Cup hopes.” – Heather Knight

Telford Vice | Cape Town

THE hair was from a movie set. The clothes were from a magazine. The crutches and moon boot were from a hospital. Dané van Niekerk made a striking sight as she waited on the wrong side of the turnstiles at Newlands in January.

After breaking her ankle in a slip on the side of the swimming pool at her home near Gqeberha, there was no way Van Niekerk was going to the World Cup. The accident had happened on the last day of South Africa’s rousing win in the second men’s Test against India at the Wanderers. Five days later the deciding match of the series started in Cape Town. Unexpectedly at a loose end, Van Niekerk was enlisted to offer her opinions on television. But it seemed no-one involved had realised that, to be granted access to the Newlands media centre, she would need to be accredited.

So there she was, all dressed up with nowhere to go on the pavement outside the ground. She was calm and respectful as functionaries scurried hither and thither trying to resolve the issue, but her face was frozen with what looked like frustration. Van Niekerk had been wrenched from a tournament that could have made her the first captain of a senior South Africa side, regardless of gender, to win a World Cup. No doubt the knowledge that her wife, Marizanne Kapp, whose 32nd birthday she had helped celebrate two days before the catastrophe, would indeed be shooting for glory in New Zealand only added to the hurt of missing out.

Now, marooned in a moon boot, propped up on crutches and conspicuous in her finery, it must have felt as if cricket itself didn’t want her around. But a plan was made and Van Niekerk’s fresh honesty, unvarnished by banal commentator-speak, was heard in South Africa and India, and far beyond. Cricket still wanted her after all.

After South Africa’s first two World Cup games, she can be confident her team would welcome her back with even more enthusiasm than they would have shown had she managed to return before the tournament. The South Africans have won both of those games, but not nearly as well as they should have for a side ranked No. 2 in the world, and considering their opponents.

Against Bangladesh in Dunedin on Saturday, South Africa were dismissed for 207 — just the fourth time in their last 10 ODIs that they have been bowled out batting first. The Bangladeshis reached the last five overs of their reply needing 43 with four wickets standing and Nigar Sultana and Ritu Moni well set. Then Shabnim Ismail nailed Moni’s leg stump, the first of four wickets to fall for nine runs in 17 balls as Bangladesh were dismissed for 175.

At the post-match press conference, Hilton Moreeng talked up the Bangladeshis’ fighting spirit and spoke of first-match nervousness. But it said much that the South Africans had sent out their head coach — always a sign that things have not gone as well as expected — to talk to the reporters rather than a significant performer in the match.

In Mount Maunganui on Friday, Pakistan limited South Africa to 49 runs in their last seven overs, in which four wickets fell, in their total of 223/9. On Thursday, Chloe Tryon had said, “[The batting against Bangladesh] was definitely under par. We discussed thoroughly that we weren’t happy with our performance. We didn’t take responsibility up the order.”

It seems more conversations on the topic are required. Certainly, Laura Wolvaardt was less enamoured with her dismissal in the 30th over — she fetched a wide delivery from Ghulam Fatima and fell to a fine return catch by the diving bowler, the first wicket in a slide of 3/10 in 17 deliveries — than her effort of 75: “I was very upset when I went out. I get very angry when I feel like I put in the hard work and then take it all the way. How I got out was, I felt, very dumb.”

Not least because of a shoddy showing in the field by the South Africans, Pakistan looked to be surging to victory when they went into the last four overs needing 38 with four wickets standing and Nida Dar 44 not out. At the same stage of their innings, South Africa were only four runs ahead and also six down.

A dozen came off the penultimate over, bowled by Ayabonga Khaka. That narrowed the equation to 10 required with two wickets in hand. Up stepped Ismail again to end Diana Baig’s dangerous innings with a sprint from the bowling crease to midwicket to take the catch over her shoulder. A panicky Fatima was run out three balls later trying to take a bye to the wicketkeeper, sealing South Africa’s victory by six runs.

Why should South Africa’s supporters be concerned about a team who have played two, won two and are third in the standings with a game in hand over second-placed New Zealand? Because they arrived at the tournament as serious contenders for the title, and they aren’t living up to that billing. Between the 2017 World Cup and this edition, only Australia had a better win/loss ratio than South Africa’s. That has not been apparent in their displays against sides ranked sixth and eighth, and who have lost all five matches they have played at this event.

South Africa now face a reality check in the shape of their match against England in Mount Maunganui on Monday. Heather Knight’s team have lost their last five ODIs: a series in Australia in February and to the Australians and West Indies at the World Cup. Before that, the 2017 champions had won seven of their previous 10 matches in the format. They are not used to failure, and they will be hell bent on snapping their sorry streak against South Africa — who they have lost to only eight times in 38 ODIs.

“We need to have a knockout mindset now; that next game against South Africa is crucial to our World Cup hopes,” Knight said after England had gone down to the Windies in Dunedin on Wednesday. “We have to bring that mindset of needing to win every game and that simplifies things, doesn’t it? And hopefully that’ll sharpen people’s minds to what we need to do, because at the moment we’re fighting for life in this tournament.”

If South Africa were playing as well as they could, those words wouldn’t raise the alarm. Under the circumstances, they blare ominously. Whether Van Niekerk’s experience and presence would have made a big enough difference — and whether she could keep a lid on the pressure cooker that will be the England match — cannot be known. But she is being missed. More so than Quinton de Kock, whose retirement from Test cricket in December after the first match of the series against India has hardly been felt because the team he left behind have, apparently, left him behind by pulling off impressive wins.

Not so Van Niekerk, who remains an important part of who and what her team have become. That isn’t obvious from the numbers. Of South Africa’s 50 ODIs with her as captain, they have won 29 and lost 18. Since her debut, and when she hasn’t led them, they have won 30 and lost 23 of 57. But there’s more to this than stats. There’s also stardust.

With her in charge South Africa make movies, often with a happy ending. Without her they look like they might need crutches. Or a kick in the appropriate spot, moon boot and all.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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World Cup squad player profiles

15 of South Africa’s best.

Telford Vice | Cape Town

WHO are the women flying South Africa’s flag at the World Cup? These are their potted biographies:

Suné Luus (captain)

Dané van Niekerk’s slippery pool deck — on which she fractured her ankle less than a month before the start of the 2022 World Cup — was Luus’ gain going into the tournament. She took over the captaincy, a job she had done in 20 previous ODIs, to keep the leadership in the hands of a leg-spinning allrounder. Luus became, in May 2017, at 21 years and 124 days, the second youngest South African and the ninth youngest woman overall to captain a national team in an ODI.

In 2016, Luus equalled the 37 wickets West Indian Anisa Mohammed took in 2011 as the world record for the most claimed in ODIs in a calendar year. Luus scored 52 and took 6/36 to become the second woman after England’s Heather Knight to make a half-century and claim a five-wicket-haul in the same ODI. When she took 6/45 against New Zealand in January 2020, she was the first woman to have two six-fers to her name. A year later, Luus became the 10th player to score 1,000 runs and take 100 wickets in ODIs.

Tazmin Brits

Tazmin Brits never planned to have a cricket career. Instead, she thought she was bound for Olympic glory. She was the junior world javelin champion in 2007 and fixed her eyes on the prize of the 2012 London Games so firmly she had the five interlocking circles of the Olympic symbol tattooed onto the inside of her right biceps. But fate had other ideas, and in November 2011 a car crash ended her athletics ambitions. More than seven years later, in May 2018, having come back from much physical, mental and emotional pain, Brits made her South Africa debut in a T20I.

Although she was without a half-century after seven ODIs heading into the 2022 World Cup, she had reached 50 three times in her 20 T20Is. That suggests a big hitter, and Brits can certainly wield the big stick when that’s needed. But she is also blessed with the ability to work the ball around the ground for ones and twos.

Trisha Chetty

As the oldest player in South Africa’s 2022 World Cup squad, Trisha Chetty is also among the most accomplished. She holds the world record for dismissals in ODIs with 165 and is the second-most capped wicketkeeper in the format after England’s Sarah Taylor. In October 2010 Chetty shared an opening stand of 170 with Shandré Fritz, then the highest partnership for any wicket in T20Is. Chetty is one of six members of South Africa’s 2022 World Cup squad to have played Test cricket.

A genuinely quick-handed stumper, Chetty is also a legitimate middle order threat having scored 16 ODI half-centuries going into the 2022 World Cup. But her most recent foray into that territory was in May 2017. Part of the reason for that is the success of the women batting above her: she wasn’t required to bat in seven of her last dozen ODIs before the World Cup.

Mignon du Preez

Although three members of South Africa’s 2022 World Cup squad are older than Mignon du Preez, she was in many ways the senior pro in the side as their most capped ODI and T20I player. Having assumed the captaincy in October 2011, she led the side in one Test, 46 ODIs and 50 T20Is before relinquishing the leadership in June 2016 in order to focus on her batting. It was with her at the helm that women’s cricket began to be taken more seriously in South Africa, hence her favoured status among players and the public.

That Du Preez had a bright future in the game was apparent as a 12-year-old, when she hit 16 sixes and 25 fours and scored 258 in an under-13 inter-provincial match. She scored 55 on ODI debut, in January 2007, and in August 2007 she and Johmari Logtenberg put on an unbroken 224 for the fourth wicket, then the second-highest stand in all women’s ODIs.

Lara Goodall

Few batters have been as eager to put risk quite as far above reward on their list of priorities as Lara Goodall. When she is at the crease, stop what you’re doing and watch. You may not be detained for long, or you may be there for a while. But you will not be bored. Goodall has no qualms about hitting the ball in the air, setting off on singles that may or may not be there, and pulling ever more inventive strokes out of her kitbag.

Those attributes would scare off the more conservative kind of coach. Happily, Hilton Moreeng has not been among them. He was instrumental in Goodall’s return to the national squad in January last year after an absence of 15 months. She also didn’t play for South Africa between January 2017 and February 2019. The reward was Goodall’s scores of 49 and 59 not out in a series of five ODIs in India in March 2021. The latter helped clinch the series.

Shabnim Ismail

South Africa’s box office fast bowler, and among the quickest and most aggressive in all the game. And if you don’t believe that, ask Shabnim Ismail — she’ll confirm exactly that. Except that she will argue no-one is faster or more aggressive. Good luck winning that debate, not least because she has the facts to counter any dissent on the matter.

Ismail was South Africa’s all-time leading ODI wicket-taker going into the 2022 World Cup, and the fourth-highest overall. She also led the South Africa list in T20Is, and was third in the world in that format. She was named player of the match after the WBBL final in November 2020, when she took 2/12 to help Sydney Thunder beat Melbourne Stars by seven wickets. She is one of the half-dozen in the World Cup squad who have played Test cricket.

Unusually for female cricketers, who attract an unfair amount of criticism which often veers into abuse, particularly online, Ismail has been open about challenges she has overcome. Her Wikipedia page lists her suspension for an incident involving alcohol abuse in July 2014, and she has admitted to dealing with an obsessive compulsive disorder.

Sinalo Jafta

Picked in the 2022 World Cup squad along with stalwart wicketkeeper Trisha Chetty, Sinalo Jafta had played only 16 ODIs heading into the tournament despite making her debut in October 2016. But, as a gutsy grafter, she has quietly kept her name in the selectors’ plans with decent performances behind the stumps and with nuggety lower order batting.

Jafta was born into the game’s Eastern Cape heartland. But she came to cricket from hockey, in which she seemed to destined for a senior international career. Once she made the choice to focus on cricket, she figured she would be a bowler. Only when she was 16 did donning the stumper’s pads and gloves appeal as something she wanted to do.

Marizanne Kapp

A fast bowler’s fast bowler. A middle order batter’s middle order batter. A cricketer’s cricketer. Marizanne Kapp is the epitome of the modern player. Her performance in both disciplines has been central to South Africa’s success since she made her debut at the 2009 World Cup. That will not change in this year’s tournament.

Kapp’s searing seriousness, particularly when she is steaming towards the bowling crease, tall and imposing, a splendid splinter on the move, is a sight to behold. But stay out of her way if things don’t go according to plan. After South Africa went down by two wickets in an intensely competitive 2017 World Cup semi-final in Bristol, Kapp spent several minutes sitting silently on the outfield long after the rest of the players had left the scene. It probably didn’t ease the pain that she was named in the ICC’s ODI team of the year in 2017.

Kapp became the first South Africa player, and only the third woman, to take a hattrick in a T20I in September 2013. Also capped at Test level, she was third among South Africa’s all-time ODI wicket-takers and second on the T20I pecking order as the 2022 World Cup loomed. She was their fifth-highest runscorer in both formats. Among those above her in all of those categories was Dané van Niekerk, whom she married in July 2018. A former provincial athlete and netball player, Kapp has a degree in sports management.

Ayabonga Khaka

If Ayabonga Khaka is in the market for a nickname, she could do worse than call herself Black Ice. No bowler is cooler under pressure, and none seems able to execute their skills to such a high level as consistently. There is an unshakeable calm about the way she goes about her business, which tends to have a settling effect on the rest of the team.

She had conceded less than a run a ball in 63 of her 73 ODIs going into the 2022 World Cup, and claimed wickets in 51 of them. Khaka banked a career-best 5/26 in January, when she was named player of the series. She was seventh, two places behind Shabnim Ismail, in the ICC bowling rankings before the tournament. Although less explosive than South Africa’s regular new-ball pair of Marizanne Kapp and Ismail, Khaka’s team have come to rely on her for stability.

Masabata Klaas

If Masabata Klaas’ medium pace looks gentle and unthreatening, be especially careful. It is anything but — as she proved in May 2019 when she became the 10th woman to claim an ODI hattrick. Which isn’t to say Klaas is a firebrand, but her subtle skills are appreciated in a side not short of emphatic players. The irony is that her sporting role model is among the most emphatic performers to grace any arena: Serena Williams.

When Klaas first asked the boys at her primary school whether she could join their break-time game of cricket, they scoffed and told her to go away. She persisted and eventually the boys relented and tossed her the ball. That was the last time she had to beg her teammates for a bowl. Ninety-five international white-ball caps later, it’s more true than ever.

Lizelle Lee

Ms Dependable herself. And Ms Devastating. Leading up to the 2022 World Cup, Lizelle Lee had passed 50 in six of her last eight ODI innings. That hot streak included her third century in the format, 132 not out off 131 balls in March 2021. In a T20I in February 2020, she hammered 101 off 60 balls.

By then, she knew how to score big and quickly. In an under-19 one-day interprovincial game in December 2010, she piled up an outrageous 427 in a total of 690/1. She smashed an undefeated 169 off 84 balls in a senior inter-provincial match in October 2013. No-one has scored more ODI hundreds for South Africa, and her 26 half-centuries is also a record. Despite that, none of her international centuries have been scored at home.

Lee is a familiar face on the English and Australian short format circuits, one of the half-dozen current South Africa players who have won a Test cap, and among eight women from anywhere who have opened the batting, kept wicket and captained in the same ODI.

Nonkululeko Mlaba

Having made her T20I debut in September 2019 and played her first ODI in January 2021, Nonkululeko Mlaba — who was 21 going into the 2022 World Cup — is among the newer members of South Africa’s dressing room. But it did her chances of quickly becoming a key member of the attack no harm that, before the tournament, she conceded less than a run a ball in all four of the ODIs in which she had bowled all 10 of her overs.

By then, Mlaba had claimed only four wickets in her eight ODIS, but they were all prized: Pakistan’s Javeria Khan, India’s Deepti Sharma and Sushma Verma — in the same match — and West Indies’ Sheneta Grimmond.

Tumi Sekhukhune

You should know what you’re getting into when a player lists her role model as Shabnim Ismail, as Tumi Sekhukhune has done. At 24 heading into the 2022 World Cup, Sekhukhune hadn’t yet had the chance to live up to her hero’s exploits. But she was making her mark — in the 19 ODIs in which she had bowled, only twice had she gone for a run a ball or more.

Sekhukhune had never batted higher than No. 9 for South Africa in her 42 matches in both white-ball formats, and in her 139 matches all told she had taken guard only 56 times. But might there be an allrounder in there somewhere? In an under-19 inter-provincial one-day game in December 2016, she came in with her team in trouble at 40/4, shared a stand of 141, and finished not out on 63 off 124 balls. Then she took 1/2 as her team polished off the opposition for 32 in 14.3 overs. It was in a T20 at that level that Sekhukhune took her first five-for — a haul of 5/15 in an innings that included eight ducks.

Chloé Tryon

Going into the 2022 World Cup, just eight women from any country had made a higher score batting at No. 6 than Chloe Tryon’s 69-ball 79 in February 2017. Her 92 off 68 deliveries in August 2016 was the second-best effort by a No. 7. She hasn’t always scored that many runs, of course, but you can count on her for at least a few: not since February 2016, or 49 innings before the World Cup, had she been dismissed for a duck. Indeed, she had been removed without scoring only four times in her 69 ODI innings.

It’s that level of reliability that has made Tryon a familiar figure in South Africa’s middle order. Since her international debut, in a T20I in May 2010, she has played in the only Test the team have contested and in almost two thirds of all their white-ball fixtures. Little wonder she was made vice-captain for the 2022 World Cup.

Laura Wolvaardt

She was only 22 at the 2022 World Cup, but it was already a cliché that Laura Wolvaardt owned the most dazzling cover drive in all of cricket. It’s more a piece of jewellery than a stroke, a thing to be noticed and marvelled at. And appreciated for the beautiful confluence of bat, ball and perfect timing that it is.

But there’s a lot more to Wolvaardt than one gem of a shot. In August 2016, she scored 105 to become, at 17 years and 105 days, the second-youngest woman to celebrate an ODI century. That was in just her seventh innings in the format at that level, by which time she had also made two half-centuries. Going into the 2022 World Cup, she had made three centuries and 21 50s — equal with and second to Lizelle Lee in South Africa’s record books — to go with her three T20I half-centuries. No woman playing for South Africa has reached 1,000 or 2,000 runs faster in ODIs, and only Mignon du Preez, Lee and Trisha Chetty have scored more runs — and they have had between 68 and 26 more innings than Wolvaardt. Three of South Africa’s top 10 highest ODI innings belong to Wolvaardt. The only other player to appear on that list more than once is Lee, who is there twice. Wolvaardt had the highest all-time ODI average by a South African before the World Cup.

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A more than suitable team

“The team make it easy. They know what they want to do. I think I’m just there to say who bowls when.” — Suné Luus

Telford Vice | Cape Town

SIX wins on a single visit? Never before has a senior South Africa team of any description achieved that level of success in India. It’s a wonky stat in the sense that only twice previously have they played six or more matches on one trip to the biggest chunk of the subcontinent. But, considering their history there, that has been merciful.

So the women’s team that will depart Lucknow on Wednesday evening having beaten India 4-1 in the ODI series and 2-1 in the T20I rubber have set themselves apart. Even their losses have a place in the narrative of victory. The first, in the second ODI by nine wickets with 31.2 overs remaining, followed a resounding win in the opening match. Would South Africa recover from that dramatic deflation? Would they ever. They scored 223/4 to win the next match. Only five times had they hunted down a bigger target, and their total would have been still higher had the innings not been reduced to 46.3 overs. Then they made 269/3 to claim the fourth match — their highest successful chase. That decided the series with a game to spare, which South Africa also won. Their sole T20I loss came on the back of a rare failure by the batting order, but it was suffered in the dead rubber that followed them holding their nerve in teetering tension to win the second match — and with it the series — off the last ball.

Lizelle Lee piled up 288 runs in the ODIs to surge to the top of the world rankings. But Punam Raut was only 25 behind with Mithali Raj 78 adrift. No other South African reached 200 runs. Jhulan Goswami and Rajeshwari Gayakwad took eight wickets each and had economy rates of 3.51 and 3.56. South Africa’s leading wicket-taker was Shabnim Ismail, with seven. The series’ most economical bowler was Ayabonga Khaka, who went for just 3.44. But she took only one wicket. Something similar unfolded in the T20Is, where Shafali Verma was the leading run-scorer with 130. No South African, nor another Indian, reached 100. Gayakwad and Ismail each took four wickets but their economy rates diverged significantly: 4.75 for Gayakwad, 8.20 for Ismail.

As much as South Africa were a juggernaut as a team, their superiority was not clear at individual level. Maybe that’s the value of stability and experience. Hilton Moreeng has been their coach since December 2012. Mignon du Preez, Marizanne Kapp and Ismail each have more than 100 ODI caps, and Ismail, Suné Luus and Lee have 98, 80 and 79 appearances in T20Is. The other side of that coin is that they have enjoyed these advantages for a long time but not performed as well as consistently as they have in recent weeks. What’s changed?

“I’m not really sure what to pin it down to, but from the way we started the Pakistan series [at Kingsmead in January and February], to the way we started the India series there was a silent confidence going around in the camp,” Suné Luus told an online press conference on Wednesday. “Nobody really thought about it, but since the moment we hit the ground running in the Pakistan series, everyone never doubted their own skill and the skill of their teammates next to them. Nobody ever doubted that we wanted to win and were going to win. There was never any fear of failure. That was maybe there previously. Everybody was determined and motivated to move forward as a team.

“Maybe we were better prepared than them, having played the Pakistan series [whereas the South Africa series were India’s first since the T20 World Cup in February and March last year]. Or maybe we believed in ourselves more. I don’t really know what was the difference, but at the end of the day we just played better cricket.”

Luus is central to an example illustrating her point. Dané van Niekerk has been South Africa’s regular ODI captain since October 2016, their T20I skipper since February 2018, and a matchwinning allrounder besides. She should thus have been vital to their chances of beating Pakistan, not to mention competing in India. But Van Niekerk — and fellow stalwart Chloe Tryon, the vice-captain — have been off the field with back injuries since November. Cue Luus’ apparently seamless elevation: South Africa beat Pakistan 3-0 in the ODIs and 2-1 in the T20Is. And now the unprecedented triumph in India.

“Dané left big shoes to fill; she’s an unbelievable leader and captain,” Luus said. “But the team make it easy. They know what they want to do. I think I’m just there to say who bowls when.”

Luus’ small smile as she made her joke later broadened when she cautioned: “You mustn’t believe anything you hear about bubble life. It’s really not as exciting as you think.” We hear a lot about the trials and travails of players trying to perform at their best despite the restrictions imposed by Covid-19 lockdown regulations. Mostly, we hear it from men. Maybe reporters women don’t ask women about this as often. Or maybe women, already facing a range of obstacles in their bid to be taken seriously in cricket, simply get on with it.

“It’s a new thing for a lot of teams and a lot of the hotels we go to,” Luus said. “We were lucky enough to have a recreational room where there was table tennis, chess and darts [equipment], and some other games as well. We could come in, switch off and not think about the game. Otherwise we could focus on some studies, catching up on assignments here and there; not too much — you’re still on a cricket tour. Everybody’s very excited to go home now and breathe in some fresh air; go walk around, whether it’s in the street or in a nature reserve. Just somewhere.”

That South Africa have been a breath of fresh air for their watching supporters is undeniable, especially in a cricket culture where the performance of the other senior national team has become a corollary for the ongoing harm being done to the game by the dangerously inept upper reaches of CSA.

It isn’t often a sponsor should be mentioned in despatches like these but an exception needs to be made for Momentum, the financial services company whose name is attached to the women’s team. The company agreed to back all male one-day cricket in South Africa, down to under-13 level, in June 2012 and it became the national women’s team’s title sponsor the next year. But in September last year it announced it would not seek to renew the contract that expired in April this year because it was, a statement at the time said, “not satisfied with the current state of affairs at CSA regarding governance and other reputational issues”. But it will continue to back the women’s side until April 2023, at least. The team’s success could be seen as Momentum’s reward for holding CSA’s feet to the fire.

“As a business we have gone through tough times, and we needed someone to believe in us when we were under pressure,” Carel Bosman, the head of sponsorship, told the press conference. “We believe in this team. Regardless of what’s going on, we’re going to continue supporting them. There will be more news coming of us supporting this team.”

It helps that the players who have your company’s name on their kit are scoring runs, taking wickets, winning games and celebrating their success for all to see on television. “As a sponsor, performance is an element that almost comes as a bonus,” Bosman said. “When we got involved with the team we believed they could be the best in the world, but ultimately it’s still down to the team, the coaching staff and the management to make it happen.”

He saw a switch flick at the 2020 T20 World Cup, where South Africa went down by five runs, on Duckworth/Lewis, in a white-knuckle semi-final against Australia at the SCG. “Something changed in their minds. They suddenly realised they can be the best and they can beat any team in the world. You can’t really explain to people how close they are. To see it all happen and to be part of that process is very special, because it’s not guaranteed.”

It isn’t, and South Africa will face a challenge to retain their positive momentum — not their sponsor — because their slate of engagements for the coming months is blank.

You don’t want to waste this form. You want to bottle this feeling. Come on CSA, do the right thing. Along with the team they feel duty-bound to watch — and who will host Pakistan in white-ball series next month — give South Africans the team they want to watch.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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Faraway fan proud of her team

“It’s about gaining confidence in what we do. You can see in our skills that the confidence is sky high.” – Dané van Niekerk

Telford Vice | Cape Town

SOUTH Africa’s No. 1 fan has been stuck on the couch since January: “Every game. I won’t miss a ball. I’m very proud; 4-1 against India in India is historical. I’d give anything to be in the changeroom at the moment.” But for a back injury, she would have been.

It’s been almost four months since Dané van Niekerk picked up a bat or bowled a ball in anger, on a drizzly Sunday at the North Sydney Oval in the colours of the Sydney Sixers. Ominously, perhaps, it was November 22 — the same date John F Kennedy had been assassinated 57 years previously. She last played for South Africa on another wet day in Australia’s biggest city: March 5 last year, when the hosts squeezed her team out of their World T20 semi-final by five runs with the help of Duckworth/Lewis.

Van Niekerk watched every game, every ball at Kingsmead in January and February as the side she has captained in 72 of her 186 internationals beat Pakistan in five of six white-ball games. And as they handed India a masterclass in their ODI series in Lucknow, which ended on Wednesday with South Africa winning by five wickets with 10 balls to spare.

The Lucknow matches started at 9am (IST), so dew was a factor — every game was won by the team batting second. India were held to totals of less than 200 three times and dismissed twice, and South Africa were bowled out for 157 in their only loss. But India have had only 11 first innings bigger than the 266/4 they made in the fourth game on Sunday, when South Africa achieved their highest successful chase to win by seven wickets with eight balls remaining.

Punam Raut and Lizelle Lee scored the series’ only centuries, but South Africa had eight half-centuries compared to India’s six. Half the eight batters who topped 100 runs in the rubber were from the visitors’ ranks. Jhulan Goswami and Rajeshwari Gayakwad were the leading wicket-takers with eight each, and both delivered better figures than the 3/28 claimed by Shabnim Ismail in the first match, South Africa’s best bowling performance in the series. So it isn’t clear why South Africa were dominant, although it is true that they played spin far better than in past Asian adventures.

For Van Niekerk the proof was in the intangibles: “This team has come a long way. There’s a lot of experience in the group and a lot of maturity around them. It’s about gaining confidence in what we do. You can see in our skills that the confidence is sky high. The players are hungry to put in performances. It’s a combination of things that have been coming for a couple of years.”

Not many sides would have played as well as South Africa did in the wake of the removal from the equation of someone as central to their cause as Van Niekerk. Add to that the absence of vice-captain Chloe Tryon, who also has a back injury and also last played on November 22. The stand-in captain, Suné Luus, missed the third and fourth matches in Lucknow — when South Africa faced their toughest chases — through illness. Laura Wolvaardt stepped in seamlessly, and scored 53 in what proved to be the series decider. To win, and win well, despite all that is remarkable.

Tryon would seem to be further from a return to action than Van Niekerk, who said: “I’m on a programme and there are protocols to follow. It’s about proving match fitness. I’m very close.” But the cricketless months have been difficult, not least because her major source of support, wife Marizanne Kapp, has not been around because she is also an integral part of South Africa’s XI. “It is a frustrating thing to go through,” Van Niekerk said. “As a cricketer you always want to play and you want to be there with the team. I call them my second family because they are; I spend a lot of time with my teammates. But the nice thing about our team is that we’re so happy for each others’ successes. To see all these youngsters putting up their hand and doing well makes me proud. It’s healthy because nobody can be complacent.”

Of the four South Africans who scored more than 100 runs in the India series only Mignon du Preez, at 31, is not in their 20s. At 28, Lee is a stalwart of 166 internationals and the top-ranked batter in ODIs. The other two, Wolvaardt and Lara Goodall, are 21 and 24. Anneke Bosch, who at 27 has eight ODI caps to her name, was afforded just two innings in Lucknow but she made them count: she was 16 not out when rain ended the third match with South Africa ahead on Duckworth/Lewis, and she scored 58 on Wednesday. Two of the five South Africa bowlers who had the best economy rates, Nadine de Klerk and Nondumiso Shangase, are 21 and 24. Their second-highest wicket-taker, Tumi Sekhukhune, is 22.

Their No. 1 fan is 27 and firmly focused on another engagement in the Antipodes, in March and April next year. “We’re building momentum going into the World Cup,” Van Niekerk said. She plans to be in the dressingroom for that. And maybe on the podium.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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Some of South Africa’s players are from Mars, others from Venus

An Ivy League of about 25 schools have, still do, and are likely to continue to supply the bulk of South Africa’s male players.

TELFORD VICE in Paarl

STRANGE symmetry struck across the Indian Ocean last Sunday. Within the same minute, Quinton de Kock hoisted Adam Zampa to Mitchell Starc at mid-off and Dané van Niekerk slapped Sophie Ecclestone to Tammy Beaumont at point. Both De Kock and Van Niekerk were captaining South Africa in a T20 and both were opening the batting. But they were more than 22 yards apart. South Africa’s men’s team were playing Australia at St George’s Park. The women’s side were up against England at the WACA. Port Elizabeth and Perth are 8,112 kilometres from each other. So South Africa’s teams might as well have been on Mars and Venus. But that’s the case even when they’re in the same city.

King Edward VII School — otherwise known as KES — Afrikaanse Höer Seunskool — or Affies — Maritzburg College, Grey College, St Stithians and Hilton were the schools attended by De Kock, Faf du Plessis, David Miller, Pite van Biljon, Kagiso Rabada and Lungi Ngidi, who were all members of Sunday’s XI. Those institutions are likely to feature in the past of any South Africa men’s XI. As well as De Kock, KES has given cricket Ali Bacher and Graeme Smith: one school, three South Africa captains. And a host of mere internationals aside. Along with Du Plessis, Affies has produced AB de Villiers, Kruger van Wyk and Neil Wagner, among many others. The school’s website doesn’t bother listing alumni among first-class players: “Scores of Affies old boys currently play for senior provincial teams.” Graham Ford, Jonty Rhodes and Kevin Pietersen went to Maritzburg College, and Kepler Wessels, Hansie Cronjé and Ryan McLaren to Grey College. As did too many other prominent players to mention. The same is true of the rest of an Ivy League of about 25 schools that have, still do, and are likely to continue to supply the bulk of South Africa’s male players.

Those schools used to be reserved exclusively not only for whites but for the most privileged among them, and their status as cricketer factories is undiminished even in the modern, racially more equitable era. Soon after Makhaya Ntini was discovered in the impoverished village of Mdingi he was packed off to Dale College in King William’s Town. Geographically, that’s a journey of eight kilometres. In every other sense, it’s as far as Venus is from Mars. Ngidi followed a similar path to Hilton, and Andile Phehlukwayo to Glenwood High. So the school sport system has, in a handful of cases, proved a more effective mechanism for pulling blacks out of the economic and social deprivation they were assigned by dint of their race than almost 26 years of post-apartheid life. Cricket has helped propel them into the middle class.

But the homogeneity of that process means men who play cricket at a high level in South Africa have grown up with largely the same set of values and a similar regard for discipline and tradition, which would be recognisable to anyone who has been to an elite alma mater of the British or colonial sort. Apartheid tried to ensure that Mark Boucher and Ntini would live in starkly different worlds. But, thanks to cricket and the schools, that is not the case. Much of Boucher’s worldview would have been formed while he was still at Selborne College. So the authority he wielded, both as a senior player and now as South Africa’s coach, was and is readily understood and accepted.

That is not the reality in the South Africa women’s team. Sport is a major factor in maintaining the prestige of boys’ and co-ed schools. But in girls’ institutions academic performance matters far more than anything else. Hence no girls’ schools have a track record for producing top class cricketers. Rather, girls have to work their way into the game, vaulting prejudice as they go. They were accepted into the boys’ soft-ball cricket programme at a particular Cape Town co-ed junior school. But only for training: they weren’t allowed to play matches. Their parents objected, and won the right for their daughters to appear in games. When the players progressed to hard-ball cricket, the girls were again excluded. Another argument ensued, another victory was won. Cricket South Africa have made moves towards gender parity, but cricket as played by girls and women struggles to be taken anywhere near as seriously as that played by boys and men. Below international level women’s cricket structures are not as established as they need to be, and unlike on the male side of the divide the only women paid to play cricket in South Africa are in the national set-up. Consequently, in another departure from the men’s game, women’s teams are collections of contrasts. They haven’t been inculcated with uniform values that cut across race, class and religious lines. So Mars and Venus are in the same dressingroom.

The least conventional aspect of Mignon du Preez’ life would appear to be that she plays cricket for a living. She is married. To a man: Tony van der Merwe. Who is an urban planner. Without trying to be snide about Du Preez or Van der Merwe, that’s about as mainstream as modern life gets. Van Niekerk and Marizanne Kapp are also married — to each other. Shabnim Ismail and Trisha Chetty are in a long-term relationship. Sometimes. Laura Wolvaardt has put a career in medicine on hold to see how this cricket gig works out. Some of the players don’t need to know the price of a pair of batting gloves. Others wish they didn’t know. Still another knows the price of illicit drugs well enough to have fallen prey to substance abuse. None of the above would be accepted in a prominent men’s team in South Africa, much less the national side.

Imagine Rabada marrying Keshav Maharaj. That would be unfathomable to some, even those who know it would be legal and that they wouldn’t blink should two men whose names they didn’t know announce their engagement. They would also acknowledge that, statistically, some male players have to be gay. Steven Davies, who played 13 white-ball games for England between March 2009 and February 2011 and 225 first-class matches, most of them for Worcestershire and Surrey from May 2005 to September last year, came out as homosexual in February 2011. But there are none in his league of bravery in South Africa and few in the wider world, as there are in other sports considered central to sadly conventional ideas of masculine identity.

Are lesbians in sports like cricket tolerated by the majority of game’s traditional audience because the assumption is they are trying to be like men, and are thus hopelessly harmless to what is considered the norm? Would that ilk of cricket follower denigrate male gay players if they knew of them, because they would threaten the perceived manliness of the status quo? Does that traditional audience not give a damn about women’s cricket anyway, so they don’t care who plays it? The answer to all of these questions is, probably, yes.

For a minute last Sunday, none of this mattered nearly as much as De Kock and Van Niekerk getting out at awkward stages. Both their teams recovered well enough to win narrowly. While the joy was shortlived for De Kock’s lot — their loss at Newlands on Wednesday confirmed their fourth consecutive series defeat — the women have secured a place in the T20 World Cup semi-finals.

Infamously, South Africa have yet to win a World Cup. Deep inside every cricketminded South African a small thought is growing: what if the women get there first? For some, that comes from a place of fear and insecurity. For many more others, it is a spark of wonder waiting to catch fire. If that happens, cricket in South Africa — regardless of who plays it — will never be the same.

First published by Cricbuzz.

SA want runs, runs and more runs (or at least some runs) for Christmas

“It was just soft dismissals every single game, stuff we speak about that we just continually do. We don’t rectify what we do wrong.” – Dané van Niekerk

TMG Digital

TELFORD VICE in London

WINNING wasn’t everything for South Africa in their last match of the World T20 in St Lucia on Monday.

Their 30-run victory over Bangladesh meant they will go home having won two of their four matches — not enough to put them in the semi-finals.

But they have avoided the unedifying prospect of having to qualify for the 2020 tournament.

“I’m glad we dodged that bullet,” Dané van Niekerk told reporters in St Lucia.. “We don’t enjoy going to qualifiers. So to not go is a relief.”

Not that Monday’s result will ease the unhappiness of a team who know they have played below their potential.

“Obviously there’s relief to have won and get a bit of confidence,” Van Niekerk said. “But I think the team is still quite disappointed.

“I saw everybody’s faces after the game. There’s a lot of disappointment around in the camp, and it’s going to hurt for a bit.”

In particular it will hurt the squad’s batting component. It is no accident that in the two games South Africa lost — against West Indies and England — they failed to reach 100.

Of the 38 batters South Africa sent to the crease at the WT20, 32 of whom were dismissed, only two scored 30 or more: Van Niekerk and Marizanne Kapp, both against Sri Lanka.

Just one of South Africa’s totals was not in the bottom half of all those scored at the tournament and Kapp is their only representative in the top 20 runscorers, in 10th place.

Kapp and Van Niekerk featured in South Africa’s highest two partnerships, of 67 and 35, and one of them was involved in their next best stands, of 31 and an unbroken effort of 29.

India, who won all of their matches to top group A, put up four half-century stands, one of which grew to 134.

But not even four 50 partnerships could earn New Zealand a place in the semis. Like South Africa they lost twice and are on the first plane home, not least because their bowlers let their batters down — they conceded 11 more runs than they scored.

So part of what will hurt the South Africans is that they made exactly the same amount of runs as they gave up — 372 — and that England got through to the final four having scored just one more than they conceded.

“It was just soft dismissals every single game, stuff we speak about that we just continually do,” a rueful Van Niekerk said.

“We don’t rectify what we do wrong, and I think that was the most frustrating part.

“You speak about plans as batters and what you don’t want to do, but then you go out there and you do exactly that. We need to be more mentally strong.”

South Africa totalled 109/9 on Monday with Kapp’s 25 their top score. None of their bowlers took more than a wicket but only two of the seven used went for more than a run-a-ball.

Laura Wolvaardt, who for all her talent scored only 16 runs in three innings at the WT20, and Yolani Fourie were left out. Shabnim Ismail, South Africa’s star bowler, was left out because of a torn hamstring.

Now what?

“Well, there’s I think six of us going to the Big Bash League [in December], which is brilliant training and preparation for the T20 cricket that’s coming up,” Van Niekerk said.

“We’ve got Sri Lanka early next year, and I’m 100% sure nobody is going to sit around and have a good festive season.

“We know there’s a lot of hard work for us. So we’ll see tomorrow and just give everybody their list to make sure that they cover everything when we get together.”

Dear Santa …