Without anyone really noticing, the national under-19 women’s cricket team reached a World Cup final three weekends ago. They lost the final — played in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia — by nine wickets to India, but the fact they got there was a remarkable achievement.
“Yes, cricket is in a good space post this year’s SA20,” says South African Cricketers’ Association CEO Andrew Breetzke. “We’re producing young players, and sponsors are queuing up. Our only concern is governance at some provinces.”
Women’s cricket at junior levels is in its infancy in South Africa. The Malaysia-based World Cup was the first time South Africa appeared at a junior World Cup event. That the team reached the final, given their comparative lack of international experience, is a miracle. And they beat the much-vaunted Aussies, who have more players and bigger budgets, in the semifinal.
The reality of the under-19s making the final was perhaps not noticed because this kind of thing is becoming commonplace, a veritable golden age for the sport, what with the men now contesting the final of the World Test Championship at Lord’s in June.
Two years ago, virtually to the day, the senior women cricketers played in the T20 World Cup final at Newlands. They were well beaten by Australia in the end but in getting there they scraped past England by six runs in the semifinal. England will beat South Africa seven or eight times out of 10. They’re better resourced, better coached and vastly more experienced. But the South Africans have pluck, savvy and gees in abundance. They took catches like women possessed in the semifinal. And it was enough to get them over the line — only just.
Last year the men’s T20 World Cup was co-hosted by the US and various nations across the Caribbean. Again, South Africa were beaten finalists, losing to Rohit Sharma’s India.
There was a time when South Africa’s men didn’t know how to play T20 cricket. Their natural conservatism — often playing not to lose rather than playing to win — meant they only sort of embraced the T20 format. Batting for only 20 overs requires adventure and improvisation. Hold back and you’re damned.
After 10 years of trying to play in the format without embracing it, more and more local players started playing in the Indian Premier League. Whether we’re talking about AB de Villiers, Faf du Plessis, David Miller or Kagiso Rabada, through exposure to the best T20 tournament in the world such players saw how best to approach T20 cricket.
The national side’s T20 philosophy became bolder. In a player like Heinrich Klaasen they discovered a batsman who goes together with T20 cricket in the way a cricket pad goes with
Velcro.
Klaasen was crucial in last year’s T20 World Cup final against India at Bridgetown’s Kensington Oval. Chasing India’s 176 for seven, he walked to the crease with the Proteas in a spot of bother at 70 for three. Combining first with Quinton de Kock (39) and, later, Miller (21), Klaasen took South Africa to within
touching distance of victory.
He scored a pugnacious 52 that contained five towering sixes but he was out when there was work yet to be done. With him gone, South Africa’s chase withered. They lost the final by seven agonising runs.
Despite the three defeats, South African cricket is now getting into finals, where this was seldom the case, say, 10 or 15 years ago. It leads one to suggest that South African sport is developing a natural momentum of its own, partly born of the confidence that comes from seeing the Springboks win two consecutive Rugby World Cups in 2019 and 2023. It is not far-fetched to argue that South African sport, after fits and starts lasting 25 years post-apartheid, is entering a golden age.
Cricket and rugby are not the only sports to prosper in this air of rising confidence. In mid-2022, Banyana Banyana, the national women’s football team, beat Morocco 2-1 in the final of the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon) in Rabat. There were 50,000 fans in the Prince Moulay Abdellah Stadium that cold night — almost all Moroccans.
Despite catcalls, abuse and the nasty North African habit of shining lights in the opposing players’ eyes, the South Africans won the game thanks to two goals by striker Hildah Magaia. Coach Desiree Ellis tells the FM: “We’d been beaten in the Wafcon final so many times before, it felt good to finally break our duck and get our hands on the trophy.”
As a result of becoming continental champions, Banyana went to the 2023 women’s World Cup, co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand. In wind and winter rain they lost their first game to Sweden by a goal but salvaged their first points in game two with a 2-2 draw against Argentina.
Their final group game was against Italy, with each side needing a win to progress in the competition. Enter Thembi Kgatlana, who scored the extra-time winner for South Africa in a 3-2 victory.
It meant that suddenly, after Banyana’s damp beginning against Sweden, they had launched themselves into the quarterfinals. Here they lost to the Netherlands but it was victory of sorts — South Africa’s women footballers were now among the best 16 teams in the world.
Many factors contributed to Banyana reaching the last 16 of the 2023 women’s World Cup. More local players play abroad, for one, and Ellis was well served by her coaching predecessor, Vera Pauw.
Ellis herself has seen it all. She was part of the first post-re-admission generation as a national player in the early 1990s. This was a time when women players used the men’s cast-offs as shirts. The national team was briefly called “Bafazi Bafazi”. Ellis remembers playing a tournament in Zimbabwe and changing in a parking lot because the changerooms were otherwise occupied.
Ellis has grown up since she was a player. For her generation, international sport has been normalised. There is now an institutional memory in South African sport. It is a memory of what to do and what not to do. South African sportsmen and women have become more worldly-wise. Former players like her have grown to coaching maturity in the system they once played in.
Confidence is contagious. It is so contagious that it has even permeated into local football, often an environment of petty politicking, bloated executives and reluctance to change.
In 2021, finally gatvol of years of underachievement, the South African Football Association chose a competent, experienced and well-travelled national coach. Hugo Broos, like Ellis, has the institutional memory and the coaching pedigree to bring best practice, continuity and calm to Bafana Bafana.
Under Broos, they reached the semifinals of the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations and have already qualified for this year’s tournament — to be hosted in Morocco at the end of the year.
The are also handily placed — behind Rwanda — in qualifying for next year’s World Cup in the US, a competition that has swollen to what some suggest is a ridiculous 48 nations. Six awkward ties in March, June and October await Bafana Bafana before passage to the US is assured.
But the portents are better than they’ve been in a long time, thanks in part to the air of confidence in both South African men’s and women’s sport.
Confidence is generated from many sources. One of those sources comes from outside the country. The International Cricket Council, for example, has already designated South Africa as the primary host for the 2027 Cricket World Cup, with secondary roles provided by Namibia and Zimbabwe. It always feels good being told by others that they believe you can do it.
It might even be time to consider an Olympic bid. Sport in Britain mushroomed in confidence after London’s hosting of the 2012 Olympics and there’s often a correlation between hosting an Olympics and that country’s position on the medals table.
Hosting might just be the fillip team South Africa needs because they don’t seem to be getting much help from the South African Sports Confederation & Olympic Committee. South Africa’s Olympians have bungled about in the mid-medal table netherworld for far too long. This is the Golden Age of South African sport, after all. It’s about time someone took the initiative and started a plausible bid for a future Olympics. Cape Town, anyone?
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