Africa-Press – South-Africa. A desire to sing Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika with her teammates and perspective provided by personal tragedy lies behind Dane van Niekerk’s decision to avail herself for the national women’s team two years after announcing her international retirement.
“I just realised how much I miss it,” she said on Monday. “I went through something traumatic in my family, my dad passed away, and [it’s] almost [as if] something like that gave me the new ‘why?’.
“It’s a strong ‘why’ for me. It wasn’t easy, there were a lot of conversations. Now is the right time. My ‘why’ is the most important thing, I want to be back contributing to this environment.”
Van Niekerk has been called into the training camp with 18 other players Proteas coach Mandla Mashimbyi is overseeing at Kingsmead this week. The camp forms part of preparations for the 50-over World Cup in India, which starts in October.
Whether Van Niekerk, who captained South Africa in 50 ODIs including at the 2017 World Cup, gets called up depends on how she copes in the next few days. But she’s grateful for the opportunity, having held intense and open conversations with Cricket South Africa (CSA) director of national teams Enoch Nkwe and Mashimbyi.
“It’s been months of connecting with the coach and CSA again and I’m thankful for the openness from both parties, where we could speak and let everything go,” said Van Niekerk.
On Monday she released a statement in which she “sincerely apologised” to CSA for how she’d handled her retirement. Van Niekerk retired in 2023 after not being picked for the home T20 World Cup, with CSA stating she’d failed to meet the requisite fitness standards expected of players.
Van Niekerk, who fractured her ankle before the last 50-over World Cup in 2022, struggled with her rehab from that injury and failed to complete a 2km time trial in the required time of 9 minutes and 30 seconds. CSA has since dropped those fitness requirements.
The 32-year-old all-rounder, South Africa’s third-highest wicket-taker in ODIs, said she was “very excited” about returning to the international game but also nervous.
“There’s a lot of perception. Few people know what the conversations were. It was important for us to have those conversations, honest ones, and be on the same page. Everyone wants the same thing and that is to win a World Cup.
“With the willingness of CSA, the coach and management, it made it easy because of how receptive they were. The chats with Enoch were nice and the nice thing is we can move forward. Whatever happened happened and we can move forward and try to build a stronger environment,” she said.
Van Niekerk’s last international match was in September 2021. Last season she signed with Western Province and finished the Pro20 competition as the fourth highest run-scorer.
In the Pro50 series she scored 179 runs in five innings, which included an unbeaten 84.
She has been monitoring the South African team’s progress since her retirement, while supporting her wife Marizanne Kapp or as a TV commentator.
“I knew how the team was evolving, when it comes to the physical side, there’s a huge difference from two years ago.
“I’m probably not where everyone else is at the moment,” she admitted.
“I understand where I need to be for the team and it will be a lot of hard work, but I would not have gone through all of this if I’m not willing to put that in.
“This is just a baseline for me to gauge where I’m at when it comes to the skill side, the physical side and all of those things. Hopefully I have a clearer view after this camp and know, with the conversations we’ve had, where I need to be in the next few months.
“Its been a positive start. Everything that has transpired is in the past and we’re building a strong relationship between myself, CSA, the coach and the team — and hopefully when the time comes, I can sing that national anthem again.”
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