Dane van Niekerk will miss the Commonwealth games due to injury. Photo: Muzi Ntombela/BackpagePix
Johannesburg - The Proteas will again be without full time captain Dane van Niekerk for the Commonwealth Games later this month, after she was unable to recover from the fractured ankle she suffered earlier this year.
Van Niekerk has been undergoing rehabilitation for the injury which also kept her out of the 50-over World Cup tournament earlier this year.
It is a significant blow for the Proteas to absorb. Van Niekerk is not only one of the best T20 players in the world, but also a cunning tactician, who’s leadership has been refined by stints in the Big Bash tournament in Australia and as skipper of the Oval Invincibles, which won the inaugural edition of The Hundred tournament in England last year.
With Van Niekerk absent, the team will continue to be led by Sune Luus, as has been the case since the World Cup in New Zealand. Crucially, Mignon du Preez, makes a return to the squad providing much needed experience in the middle order. Du Preez, 33, announced her retirement from One-Day Internationals and the Test format following the World Cup.
At the last T20 World Cup in Australia in 2020, Du Preez played a couple of crucial innings that helped South Africa qualify for the semifinals of that tournament, where they came up just short against the hosts, in a rain interrupted match in Sydney.
The rest of the squad contains no surprises and as has been the case for the last few years they will relay heavily on their seam bowlers; Marizanne Kapp, Shabnim Ismail and Ayabonga Khaka, to make a deep run at the tournament.
Women’s cricket is making its debut at the Commonwealth Games, with a T20 competition. The men previously played a 50-overs format at the 1998 Games in Kuala Lumpur, where South Africa won the gold medal, beating Australia in the final.
The competition will feature eight nations, which will be split into two groups of four, with the top two teams in each group qualifying for the semifinals. The winners will play off for the gold medal, while the semi-final losers will face each other for the bronze medal.
The Proteas open their campaign against New Zealand at Edgbaston on July 30.
Squad
Anneke Bosch, Trisha Chetty, Nadine de Klerk, Lara Goodall, Sinalo Jafta, Marizanne Kapp, Ayabonga Khaka, Maria Masabata Klaas, Sune Luus (capt), Nonkululeko Mlaba, Tumi Sekhukhune, Shabnim Ismail, Chloe Tryon, Mignon van der Merwe (Du Preez), Laura Wolvaardt
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