Wolvaardt keen to lift T20 World Cup trophy as South Africa Women captain
Sep 22, 2024
New Delhi [India], September 22 : South Africa Women (SAW) skipper Laura Wolvaardt wants to take South Africa one step forward by winning the ICC Women's T20 World Cup title.
South Africa created history in the previous edition of the Women's T20 World Cup by making their first-ever final in the event. Skipper Laura Wolvaardt looked at the run as a watershed moment for women's cricket in the country.
"Reaching our first-ever World Cup final in 2023 was a big landmark moment for us. It was a big breaking the barriers and pushing the boundaries' moment for the team," Wolvaardt said as quoted by the ICC.
But Wolvaardt was eager to improve on the previous performance, where they lost to Australia in the final, hoping to lead South Africa to a maiden T20 World Cup title.
"Before that [2023 T20 World Cup], we'd made the semi-finals on a number of occasions, so to be able to go that one step further was very important for us as a group. Now we'd like to go that one step further and lift the trophy, but anything can happen in a final in T20 cricket once you've played a whole competition to get there," the Proteas captain said.
Wolvaardt believes the T20 World Cup 2024, being played in Sharjah and Dubai in the UAE, evens the playing ground as no side will have the home advantage anymore.
"I'm very excited about the T20 World Cup being in Dubai and Sharjah. I think what's pretty cool is that it's sort of neutral territory for all of the teams. Most of the teams will be going in with the same amount of experience in the conditions, not having played there much before, so that's quite exciting. It will be quite interesting to see which team adapts the best to the conditions and is able to sum it up as quickly as they can," the opener concluded.
South Africa are in Group B of the competition along with England, West Indies, Bangladesh, and Scotland. They open their campaign against West Indies on 4 October in Dubai.
