Born on April 26th 1999 in Milnerton, Western Cape, current ODI and T20I player for South Africa, Laura Wolvaardt.
Laura was playing cricket in the backyard from the age of five and at school, she played cricket with the boys. It comes as no surprise that she made her debut for Western Province under-19’s at the age of eleven. In 2013/14 she was named CSA under-19 female cricketer of the year. It was in that same season that she made her debut for the senior Western Province team at the age of fourteen.
In February 2016 Laura made her ODI debut for South Africa and later that same year, in August, she made her T20 International debut. Since then she has been a feature of the South Africa team in both formats although she has a better resume in the fifty over game.
Laura has scored over 3000 runs in ODIs and is climbing the all-time run scorers for South Africa.
Laura took a little longer to take that same kind of form into the T20 game. A player who plays the ball with classic cricket strokes, she was seen to be a little slow to get going in T20 cricket. That has since changed – the beautiful shots are still there but she gets going far more quickly. Indeed, her 41 not out in the World Cup in March 2020 nearly helped South Africa into the final.
A Test debut at Taunton against England in June 2022 sees Laura having played all three formats of the game for South Africa.