Ken Borland

Robyn Searle

The Fidelity Titans captain probably does not get the adulation she deserves after another stellar season in 2023/24. The right-handed opener was the team’s leading run-scorer in both the one-day and T20 competitions, and a model of consistency.

In the 50-over tournament, her tally of 397 runs was second only to Proteas star Tazmin Brits in the overall run-scorers list, while her 233 runs in the T20s was the fifth best nationally. Five half-centuries in 10 innings in the one-dayers left her with an outstanding average of 44.11.

The 27-year-old Searle is an elegant strokeplayer who can score all around the wicket. Born in Johannesburg, she initially played for Gauteng, before joining the University of Pretoria and the Titans.

Paulinah Mashishi

Paulinah Mashishi bowled her off-spin with such skilful nuance last season that she was the joint leading wicket-taker in both the one-day and T20 competitions.

Undoubtedly the banker of the Fidelity Titans attack, the Hammanskraal product took 18 wickets in ten 50-over matches, a tally only matched by Proteas star Nonkululeko Mlaba. Mashishi averaged just 19.11 and conceded only 3.90 runs per over. In the T20s, she also averaged 19 as she took 11 wickets, conceding just 5.38 runs-per-over.

Hailing from the Tshwane University of Technology, Mashishi bowls with a high action and is wonderfully accurate. She was named the Titans player of the season earlier in 2024.

Tebogo Macheke

Identified as a wicketkeeper/batter of much potential, Macheke has played for the SA Emerging team and been invited to senior Proteas camps.

Hailing from Hammanskraal, Macheke averaged 23.25 with the bat in six one-day matches for the Fidelity Titans last season, and scored 108 T20 runs at better than a run-a-ball.

Now 24, Macheke played for the Limpopo Impalas for a couple of seasons, but returned to Northerns in 2022.

Ricea Coetzer

Just 24 years old but a stalwart of the team, Coetzer has been playing for the Fidelity Titans since 2016.

The Titans have been able to take advantage of her accurate spin bowling to restrict opposition batting line-ups, and last season she had an economy rate of 6.77 in T20s and 4.96 in one-day cricket, playing nine matches across the two formats.

But the teacher and former University of Pretoria player has also been known to rip through batting line-ups and in the 2021 Women’s Provincial League in Cape Town she returned the astonishing figures of five for six in 10 overs against the Central Gauteng Lions.

Coetzer is also handy with the bat, with a highest List A score of 70.

Gandhi Jafta

Intellectual prowess and sporting success flow into each other for Gandhi Jafta as this University of Pretoria star combines lecturing and doing her doctorate in Mathematical Statistics with being a key all-rounder for the Fidelity Titans.

Educated at Lilyfontein in East London and making her senior provincial debut for Border as a 16-year-old in 2015, Jafta’s life and career flew to new heights at Tuks. She was named the leading university’s Cricketer of the Year in both 2020 and 2022, and made her debut for the Titans in 2018.

Last season, Jafta excelled with the ball for the Titans in the 50-over competition, taking 10 wickets in seven matches with her well-flighted off-spin, averaging just 20.10 with an economy rate of only 4.46.

As a batter, she relies more on feel than power and scored her second half-century for the Titans last season. She has also represented the SA Emerging team and was a member of the squad that reached the final of the Africa Games in Ghana.

Katherine Prior

The Fidelity Titans were fortunate to receive good starts in most of their innings last season thanks to the presence of Prior and skipper Robyn Searle at the top of the order.

The Mpumalanga product’s transformation from a bowling all-rounder to top-order batter was made complete in 2023/24 as Prior scored 305 runs for the Titans in the one-day competition, second only to Searle, at a superb average of 61.00, including three half-centuries. She was also the aggressor up front in the T20 tournament, striking at 106.66.

Prior is more of a part-time bowler these days, but her bustling medium-pace, with a bit of swing, still chips in with useful wickets.

Amogelang Maphangula

Amogelang Maphangula is the sort of white-ball player that gets viewers up off their couches – an exciting, dominating middle-order batter and a wonderful fielder.

Fresh out of her teens, Maphangula was really able to express herself with the bat in the 50-over competition last season, scoring 153 runs at an average of 25.50 and a phenomenal strike-rate of 124.39 – the best in the tournament.

She performed her finishing role with intent in the T20 league, striking at 103.70.

A thrilling season for Maphangula saw her play in Japan as part of an exchange programme and she was named the Titans’ Most Promising Player at the end of the local campaign.

Who knows where Maphangula’s cricketing odyssey will end, what we do know is that it will get spectators on their feet.

Kay-Leigh Tapp

Tapp began her provincial career way back in 2006 in Durban, where she was born, and, going into her 15^th season of senior cricket, she is still a wonderful pace bowler. Tapp joined the Titans in 2021 after a four-year break from the game; her appointment as head of girls’ sport and physical education at Beaulieu Preparatory School was why she moved to Gauteng.

The 34-year-old was a key member of the Fidelity Titans’ one-day team last season, taking 11 wickets, but what she did particularly well was restrict the batters – conceding just 3.83 runs-per-over. Tapp was similarly economical in the T20 competition, going for just 7.71 runs-per-over.

Tapp is a tall bowler who is able to bowl consistent lines and can either hit the deck hard or get the ball up to the batter.

Monalisa Legodi

One is loathe to put too much pressure on young cricketers and Monalisa Legodi is still a teenager but has become a regular in the Fidelity Titans senior outfit. The tall and athletic pace bowler played 13 times in both one-day and T20 cricket for the team last season and was particularly effective in the 50-over game, taking seven wickets in six matches at an average of 19.85 and conceding just 5.14 runs-per-over.

Having already played for the SA U19 and SA Emerging teams, Legodi is poised to enter Titans lore if she continues to mature into the bowler she is expected to become. As far back as December 2020, Legodi, from the Soshanguve hub, grabbed an opportunity to impress then senior national coach Hilton Moreeng with her performances when he attended the Women’s Super League in Cape Town.

Alysia Rudolph

The 27-year-old Rudolph is a new signing from Division II side Easterns. A marvellously talented cricketer, she can bowl mesmerising off-spin as well as being a mighty striker of the ball, either at the top of the order or as a finisher.

Rudolph was a star all-round sportsgirl at Vereeniging Gimnasium and first played senior cricket in the Gauteng system, where she spent five years. She joined Easterns in 2020/21 and has earned her stint back in the domestic top division by virtue of her performances with the ball last season. Rudolph was the leading wicket-taker in the T20 Division II competition as well as being in the top-five in one-day cricket. With the bat, she struck at 84.31 in the 50-over game and 120.89 in the shortest format.

Pura Andreou

A product of the powerful Cornwall Hill College cricket system, Pura Andreou is a new signing for the Fidelity Titans, fresh out of school. But she has been a dominant batter not just against her peers, but in Northerns senior premier league club cricket. Andreou plays for Irene Villagers and shone for them back in April at the T20 national club championships. Andreou has played for the Titans U19 team since 2021, taking a terrible toll on bowling attacks since then.

Masabata Klaas

The Proteas stalwart hails from Botshabelo in the Free State and joined the Fidelity Titans last season, enjoying a marvellous debut campaign in which she topped both the batting and bowling averages for the team in the T20 competition. Klaas claimed seven scalps in her five T20s, averaging just 15.00 and conceding just 5.52 runs-per-over. She also showed she has the makings of a genuine all-rounder, producing some mighty blows as she scored 94 runs in four innings, being dismissed just once and scoring at a magnificent strike-rate of 130.55.

Klaas took six one-day wickets, with an economy rate of only 4.40, and also averaged 25.33 with the bat, at a strike-rate of 83.51.

A bustling pace bowler who keeps to tight off-side lines and has an excellent slower-ball, Klaas has played nearly 150 times for South Africa in all formats and is an inspirational figure because she took time off from her career to be a mother.

Laura Wolvaardt

A prestigious signing for the Fidelity Titans last season, Wolvaardt’s hot run of form just keeps rolling on, even though she has also now taken over the captaincy of the Proteas. In Tests she became just the third player to score a century in all three formats of women’s international cricket; in ODIs she powered her way to five centuries last season while scoring 925 runs in 15 innings, at an average of 84.09 and a strike-rate of 88.68; and in T20s she averaged 62 with a strike-rate of 124.

A global superstar who has won the Big Bash League twice and has also played in the T20 leagues in England and India, Wolvaardt was named South Africa’s Player of the Year earlier in 2024 and walked away with four other awards. Born in Milnerton and educated at Parklands College in the Western Cape, Wolvaardt first began playing cricket with boys when she was four years old.

A supreme stylist at the crease, with arguably the most beautiful cover-drive in the game, opening batter Wolvaardt combines technical excellence with fiery strokeplay.

Anneke Bosch

The 31-year-old Proteas regular joined the Fidelity Titans last season and, without ever going wild with the bat, enjoyed a very solid debut season for the Sky Blue Daisies.

Bosch averaged 39.50 in 50-over cricket and 37.75 in the T20 competition. Technically correct as a batter who is flexible enough to bat in the top-order and lower down, Bosch also offers part-time seam bowling and has a dozen international wickets to her name.

Hailing from East London, Bosch’s journey to the Titans has taken her via Border, Free State and North-West. She made her Proteas debut in 2016 and is a qualified biokineticist.

Sune Luus

The Titans legend and former Proteas captain goes into the 2024/25 season having enjoyed her own version of an Indian summer to give her plenty of momentum. Luus scored 65 and an epic 109 in South Africa’s Test against India in Chennai in June, showing that beneath the broadest of smiles there is a character with huge tenacity.

Luus, who has a cricket-mad father and older brother, took up the game at the age of four and by the time she was 13, she was playing for the Titans senior side already, debuting in 2009. Luus was a top-order batter for the Hoërskool Menlopark boys team through to U15 level, taking on provincial representatives.

Apart from scoring more than 3700 runs for South Africa in all formats, Luus has also taken more than 150 white-ball wickets with her well-flighted leg-spin.

A gutsy performer, Luus is one of the most accomplished cricketers to come out of Northerns territory and everyone at the Titans was delighted to see her back to her best for the Proteas, after some tough series.

Luus fitted in four appearances for the Fidelity Titans last season between all her international commitments and played a couple of blazing knocks in the T20 competition, striking at 155.10.

Eliz-Mari Marx

A penetrative pace bowler and a big-hitting batter, Marx has been part of the Titans set-up since 2016, when she was just 13 years old.

But last season was her breakthrough campaign. The all-rounder started the season by nailing the SWD Badgers attack for 115 runs off just 66 balls, an innings studded with 11 fours and six sixes. In December she made her Proteas debut and in February she claimed two key wickets in a robust spell of pace bowling during South Africa’s historic first ODI win against Australia on their home turf.

Born and bred in Pretoria, Marx went to Hoërskool Zwartkop, the same school that produced Titans legend Mignon du Preez. Physically powerful, Marx is fast becoming a key player for the Daisies and a rising talent in South African cricket.

Gordon Matheson

Gordon Matheson comes to SuperSport Park as the new head coach of the Fidelity Titans after three challenging seasons in charge of the Mpumalanga senior men’s team.

An experienced mentor who has been coaching since 2001, Matheson was previously in charge of the King Edward V11 1^st XI and played a pivotal role in the development of exciting new stars in South African cricket like Bryce Parsons and Mitchell van Buuren.

A coach who is strong on batting and building relationships with his players, Matheson was introduced to the game as a young child by his grandfather (also Gordon), who played first-class cricket for Griqualand West in the 1960s.

Athi Maphosa

Having been the assistant coach of the KZN Inland Tuskers men’s team in Division One last season, Athi Maphosa is an exciting addition to the Fidelity Titans coaching staff.

The 34-year-old Maphosa has plenty of playing experience, appearing more than a hundred times for the KZN Inland team as a tidy pace bowler, as well as featuring in 13 franchise matches for the Dolphins.

Born in Umzimkulu in the southern Natal Midlands, Maphosa was educated at Maritzburg College and played for the SA Schools Colts side in 2008. He has also been involved in coaching at hubs level – at Sweetwaters.

Being able to bowl consistently at speeds in excess of 140km/h is obviously a great asset in Test cricket and South Africa have had two of their prime express pace options in Anrich Nortje and Gerald Coetzee removed from the equation, but the Proteas are content they have all their bowling bases covered for the World Test Championship final against Australia at Lord’s next month.

South Africa announced their 15-man squad for the showpiece final on Tuesday and Nortje and Coetzee were both excluded based on concerns over their match fitness and their ability to last all the days of what could be a six-day Test. Nortje has played just once for Kolkata Knight Riders in this year’s Indian Premier League, while Coetzee returned to action this month and has played twice for Gujarat Titans. But four-over spells are hardly a base in terms of conditioning for the demands of Test cricket and coach Shukri Conrad has wisely left both out of the final squad, however much he would have wanted them there.

Dane Paterson and Lungi Ngidi have been called up instead and both have the experience to deal with the pressures of a final and the skills to bowl effectively at Lord’s. And Corbin Bosch, the most like-for-like bowler to Nortje and Coetzee, has also been named in the squad.

“We all enjoy sheer pace, but unfortunately Anrich’s return to the Test squad just did not pan out the way we hoped. He was due to play in the Centurion Test against Pakistan but then suffered a broken toe and is now in no position to play a Test match,” Conrad said at Cricket South Africa headquarters in Johannesburg on Tuesday.

“Gerald has been able to make his way back on to the field as well, but he’s in a similar boat as Anrich when it comes to bowling loads. But if you look at what Corbin has done against Pakistan, then you’ll know he’ll provide really good cover and could even make the starting XI depending on conditions.

“Corbin certainly doesn’t lack pace, so we are not too compromised on that front, he brings really good balance to the squad. The medical staff have been in touch with all the bowlers since the IPL started. They might not get the necessary workloads in the matches, but they are at the nets and we are all very happy that they’re doing the necessary work, they report regularly to us and we are very comfortable with where we are at. And Australia are in a similar position to us,” Conrad said.

Bavuma said he was very happy to have Ngidi and Paterson, both more fast-medium practitioners but with plenty of seam-bowling skills that will suit English conditions very well, in his attack. Especially Ngidi, even though the 29-year-old has not played a Test since last August in the West Indies.

“Playing in Australia or South Africa, the conversation about extra pace is definitely bigger, but there’s a different view for fixtures elsewhere. Control and skill is a lot more of a thing in England and having Lungi and Dane will definitely benefit the team.

“With Lungi, if he’s fit and motivated then you know what you’re going to get, whether he’s been playing for six months or not. So there’s no massive risk with him, I know what I’m going to get and he’s a senior player. The team listen to what he has to say and there’s a lot of backing and confidence in him in the team,” Bavuma said.

While the coach conceded that Australia were probably favourites for the one-off final, he and captain Temba Bavuma were still full of fighting talk about their prospects.

“We probably go in as underdogs, not in terms of ability but experience. But I’m very confident that if we play to our best then we have every chance of beating them. We never just want to compete and, while reaching the final was a goal, so was winning it. That was the goal Temba and I set out once the Test side started to get some momentum.

“We have very good players, our bowling attack is always a threat and we have batsmen who have the ability to put the Australians under pressure. Every Test for us lately has almost been a must-win and the players have shown they can deal with those pressures.

“And it’s great that the final is against Australia because we haven’t played them for a while and they are the one side we always want to topple and show the world that we belong at the top table. Test cricket is the lifeblood of the game around the world, the other formats rely on it and the ICC need to take it in hand and look after it rather than the whims and fancies of a few nations,” Conrad said.

Bavuma said another opportunity to secure some long-awaited ICC silverware should not be seen as added pressure, but rather a reward for playing very good cricket in the World Test Championship.

“We have some experience in knockout games now and getting into these positions shows that we have been playing very good cricket, playing well enough to get into those matches. Now it’s about what we need to do to get over the line, what exactly do we need to do differently? Or, what happens to us emotionally that we do something different when we should just stick to what we’ve been doing.

“But we are not really feeling any extra pressure, we have a 50/50 chance and we will make sure it stays that way by preparing as well as we can and making sure we leave no stone unturned. We have found ways to be successful and we take confidence from that. We respect Australia, but we have certainly earned our place in the final,” Bavuma said.

WTC Final squad: Temba Bavuma, Aiden Markram, Tony de Zorzi, David Bedingham, Tristan Stubbs, Kyle Verreynne, Ryan Rickelton, Lungi Ngidi, Keshav Maharaj, Corbin Bosch, Kagiso Rabada,  Dane Paterson, Senuran Muthusamy, Marco Jansen, Wiaan Mulder.

A few years ago, Proteas all-rounder Sune Luus was in the throes of a terrible time in her career, battling a loss of form and confidence, as well as injury. But now the Pretoria-born star says she is rejuvenated and looking forward to a bright new future with the South African women’s team having a new coach in Mandla Mashimbyi.

Between the summers of 2020 and 2021, Luus scored just 108 runs in eight ODI innings, and in eight T20 knocks in 2021 and 2022, she scored just 88 runs. The leg-spinner also struggled with the ball: In T20s between 2021 and 2023, she bowled just 20 overs, conceding 159 runs and taking only two wickets. From 2023 to the winter of 2024, she did not bowl at all in ODIs.

But her best form has returned as she scored 65 and an epic 109 in the one-off Test against India last year in Chennai and was the dominant batter in one-day cricket in the last domestic season, scoring 359 runs in six innings, at an average of 119, for the Titans. She has also regained confidence in her bowing by switching to off-spin and the 29-year-old was her team’s most economical bowler in the T20 competition.

“You’re always going to get ups-and-downs in your career and it was a tough time. I kinda came to the end of my bowling leg-spin, and it was always very important to me to be able to contribute in all three departments.

“We now have a new national coach in Mandla and he has slotted right in and brought a new energy. I really enjoy that because the way I specifically play my game, I like to play with energy and feed off the youngsters.

“Now that I’m in my 14^th year of international cricket, I’m playing with confidence again. I’m not going to be training as much, for me it’s about keeping in touch with my game and fine-tuning it. You need to back your skills. And when any of the youngsters come to me, hopefully I can add some of that confidence and mental strength to their games,” Luus told kenborland.com in an exclusive interview after she won the Titans Player of the Year award in Centurion.

While the South African women’s team has become much more of a force in world cricket since Luus started playing for the Proteas in 2012, they have not yet been able to win an ICC global event.

They reached the finals of both the 2023 and 2024 T20 World Cups, but lost to Australia and New Zealand respectively. In 2017 they reached the semifinals of the 50-over World Cup for the first time since 2000, and made the last four again in 2022.

“Obviously winning finals is now the next step we want to take as a team in this new era,” Luus said. “We’ve managed to get over our semifinals thing, but fallen short in two finals now. So we’ve managed to get stronger in winning semifinals, and now that we’ve been there in two finals, hopefully we can now win one of those too.

“I believe Mandla will help us get to that next level, winning trophies was one of his strengths when he was the coach of the Titans men’s team. The first T20 final we were in, it was kinda a case of just being chuffed to be there, but the second one we were really gunning for the win, but unfortunately New Zealand were just stronger than us on the day.

“We’ve never made the 50-over World Cup final and it’s now time to rectify that when the next tournament starts in September,” Luus said.

Tristan Stubbs, the 23-year-old Proteas batting prospect, has now been earmarked for the crucial number three position in the Test team, a crown prince following in the footsteps of South African greats like Hashim Amla and Jacques Kallis.

Amla scored 7993 runs at an average of 49.95 batting at number three for South Africa, the record, while Kallis, who scored the most runs overall for the Proteas, made the number four slot his own but established his career at first wicket down from 1997 to 2009, playing 49 Tests there and averaging 49.

Given that Stubbs has only played a single Test and just 18 first-class matches, it was a surprise when Proteas Test coach Shukri Conrad was emphatic that the Eastern Cape product would be the number three batsman going forward, starting with the two-Test series in the West Indies next month.

“It shows how highly I rate Tristan,” Conrad said after announcing the Test squad. “Technically, he is one of our best batsmen and I believe he is unfairly seen as just being a white-ball player. The way he came in under pressure in the T20 World Cup and commanded his space, he imprinted himself on games.

“He’s a helluva player, the type I want at the top of the order. He has all the makings of a top-class number three. We have eight Tests in this cycle, so he will get a really good run with one eye on the future. Some may say it’s a big call, but I don’t believe I’m throwing him in the deep end, I’m not giving him a task I don’t think he can handle,” a typically forthright Conrad said.

Players coming from the Eastern Cape are often of rural stock and typically have no airs and graces, it being a strong farming community. Stubbs fits the stereotype: humble but in no way doubting his ability to fulfil the responsibility Conrad has given him.

“Batting number three for the Test side is a huge opportunity and challenge and I’m very thankful to the coach for backing me,” Stubbs told sportsboom.com in an exclusive interview. “Any time someone praises you like that, you don’t ever want to let them down. But I’ve dealt with a lot of expectation in my career before.

“It’s going to be a completely new role for me, but I’m going to go out and enjoy it and I’m really optimistic that I’ll be ready for it when I get on the plane to the Caribbean next week,” Stubbs said from the Proteas training camp in Durban.

Stubbs’s performances in the T20 World Cup suggest he is certainly up for the challenge. While 165 runs in eight innings at a strike-rate of 101.22 are mediocre figures at face value, he played most of his innings on extremely testing pitches and was batting up the order. He had the highest batting average (33.00) for South Africa in the tournament and played a key role in their progress to the final.

“It was a different role for me because I’ve never come in before when the team has lost two quick wickets, batting in the powerplay, trying to see off the new ball. But I really enjoyed it, coming in in some really tough positions. I enjoy batting when it is tough,” Stubbs said.

A natural strokeplayer and a powerful hitter of the ball, it is not surprising that Stubbs has made his mark initially in white-ball cricket. But he has a top-class record in the four-day game, averaging 50.20.

The fact that his last red-ball innings was a landmark innings of 302 not out for Eastern Province against KwaZulu-Natal Inland in February in South Africa’s premier red-ball competition, and that he has a phenomenal conversion rate of going to his hundred five of the six times he has passed fifty, suggest he has the makings of a quality number three. And a great desire for big runs.

“I took a lot of confidence from that triple-century. Our coach, Robin Peterson, is always harping on about we mustn’t just score hundreds – that’s not good enough, we must score big centuries,” Stubbs said.

“I got to go in early [at 20 for two] and I was able to bat all day. In the last year or so, I’ve really tried to value my wicket more. I’m always looking to score, but I also want to be more consistent. So I’ve put a big emphasis on not getting out, and that’s in all formats, particularly T20. Before I would get in and then play a stupid shot to get out. Now I’m trying to bat until the last over.

“I probably take more confidence, though, from how I batted in New York during the T20 World Cup, because of how I reacted when I was under high pressure. I really enjoy batting, I joke with my mates that the only time I’ve been dismissed between 50 and a hundred in first-class cricket is when my team-mate ran me out! So I would probably love a five-day draw with both teams making 600 in the West Indies,” Stubbs said with a laugh.

While he admitted healing would be slow from their T20 World Cup final disappointment – “it hurts so much more because we had done so well before” – Stubbs has exciting new opportunities lying ahead of him that will help ease the pain.