International Cricket Council Women’s Cricket World Cup 2022

The 2022 Women’s Cricket World Cup is due to begin today, 04 March, in New Zealand. This tournament will finish on 03 April and promises to bring some interesting matches for the various competing countries. Africa’s only team, The Proteas, comes from South Africa, so perhaps the time has come for other African countries to take their lead towards women’s cricket! This former ‘Gentlemen’s Game’ has been transformed and is now a viable profession for both men and women – this year’s winning women’s team will take home $1.32 million (R20.3m) in prize money! It also presents an opportunity for women in African countries to show their ball talents to the rest of the world.

There are only seven other competing countries against South Africa (ranked #2 on the ICC Women’s ODI table); viz Australia ranked #1, England ranked #3, India #4, Ireland, New Zealand, Bangladesh and Pakistan. The games will be played in six venues around New Zealand with today’s match being in Dunedin. South Africa will start off the tournament today, playing against Bangladesh, the Proteas overall quest being to be crowned #1 in the world! Players will be transported to the various venues in chartered aeroplanes and the final games will be played in Christchurch.

The South African squad is well prepared for this tournament and the players are at their peak having had five successive wins over New Zealand, Pakistan, India and two wins over the West Indies. Each of the eight teams in the tournament has a squad of 15 players, with a maximum of three travelling reserves.

A possible problem may be Covid as New Zealand has experienced a huge rise in the Omicron variant and Heather Knight, the English captain, says the tournament is unlikely to be ‘covid-free’. It has been announced that teams can fulfil World Cup fixtures if they have nine fit players. All teams can also use female members of their backroom staff as fielding substitutes.

South Africa has an exceptional player in Laura Wolvaardt, a teenage prodigy, who has always been ahead of the pack. Laura made her cricket debut at the age of 16 when she played for South Africa against England in 2016. Laura averages 44.32 in Women’s One-Day Internationals and now at an age of 22 is the second youngest player in the team. She gave up her medical studies at Stellenbosch University to pursue a career in cricket and is now doing a BSc in Life Sciences through the University of South Africa, a distance-learning institution.

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