CWC 2025: Eight years in waiting, Nadine de Klerk conquers her dream

NAVI MUMBAI: Nadine de Klerk loves a good celebration on the cricket field. It doesn’t matter whether she took the wicket of an opener or a tail-ender, the South African all-rounder celebrates like she has won everything in life. For her, every small win, every moment mattered, especially when she was bowling. So much so that at times her teammates make fun of her for that. In fact, it is something that has been a “part of DNA and struggling to change.”

However, that is not necessarily the case when she bats. At least, until the cricketing world saw De Klerk play the knock of her career against India in the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup a few weeks ago. Soon as she hit the winning runs, a six nonetheless, the South African raised her arms aloft and let out a roar that resonated through the ACA-VDCA Stadium in Visakhapatnam.

“Normally when I bat, I'm not really a big celebrator, to be honest. I just think my emotions probably got the better of me in that India game,” De Klerk laughs during a conversation with this daily. “I think because the game felt lost at a stage and, and then it wasn't and we got over the line and I guess just to be a part of it and to hit the winning runs was a really special moment for me. I think just the emotions, it is World Cup cricket at the end of the day and every game matters. It took a lot of pressure off us. I mean, World Cups are special,” she adds.

Indeed, World Cups are special for any cricketer. And for De Klerk, this edition of the tournament is even more special. The South African all-rounder has waited eight years to play in one. She was a part of the 2017 squad that reached the semifinal, but barely 17 at the time, De Klerk did not get a chance to play.

Five years later, she did not make the main squad and was a part of the travelling reserves. De Klerk describes the feeling of coming into the tournament more as excitement rather than nerves. She believes it was probably for the best that the 2025 edition is her first WC. “I'm much better off playing this World Cup if I have to take this compared to 2022. I feel much better prepared, understand my game a bit better, feel a bit more confident. I was just very excited for this opportunity. It's great to be a part of a team that's made another semifinal. I think our team is just getting better and better by the day,” she says.

For the 25-year-old, the understanding and the evolution came as she started playing regularly three years ago. Having made her debut in 2017 as a, De Klerk warmed the bench for the better part of her career until 2022. And much like the current superstars of the game, the South African broke into the set up very young (17) and it was not easy.

“I think it's very overwhelming when you start out that young. You're still in school and you're still trying to figure out who you are, who you want to be and all of those sorts of things. Then you are on probably the biggest stage of sports in the world, really. From a batting point of view, I have always kind of been that finisher within the team. But I think I couldn't quite nail it. I'm still learning to nail it at the moment as well. It was again quite overwhelming when I was a bit younger and I myself wasn't actually sure how it looked. It was more from a mental point of view actually. I tried to change heaps when I was a bit younger because you always want to listen to all the different coaches and all the different ideas. I think in that process, I lost myself a little. I think I lost that power hitting game that I was known for when I actually came into the set-up. I tried to be someone else, and it just didn't work,” she explains.

What it also meant is that she had the time to learn and grow on the job. “If you take even Smriti (Mandhana), for example, is only 29 or whatever. I think it helps when you start off that young because it allows you a bit more time. If you start out as a 25-year-old and it takes you three or four years to settle at the international stage, you're almost 30. Because I started at 17, it almost allowed me that bit of extra time. I was in the system since I was 17, but I only really started playing at 22. I almost had five years where I was touring with, carrying drinks, learning, figuring out how I want to play, what is my game looking like at the moment, and then trying to build on that.”

Even though she did learn the ropes on the sidelines, it was not until she got on the park, soaking the pressure of it all that De Klerk understood the ins and outs of her game. Till 2022, she had not played more than nine ODIs. It became nine in 2023, 11 in 2024 and 15 in 2025 (till the league stage of the WC). The more she played, the better she became. De Klerk has 553 runs since 2024 (only behind Laura Wolvaardt, Tazmin Brits and Marizanne Kapp for SA) and also has taken 26 wickets (only second to Nonkululeko Mlaba’s 34).

“I think that was probably the biggest thing. I think you can only grow that much when you're sitting on the side at the end of the day. We all know that doing is actually the best way to learn and to figure stuff out,” she said, before adding, “I think I got an understanding. You fail a couple of times, you figure out, what did I do wrong? Where can I get better? There was a time where I actually got a lot of back-to-back opportunities, and I think that was probably the biggest turning point,” she said, before adding, “When do I go aggressive? When do I take my time? How do I kind of go about it and build in innings? But I think, especially over the last year and a bit, I think I've started to understand my role coming in at number seven or eight a bit better, and I really tried to make that spot my own. I really worked hard on setting up games, building in innings, not necessarily just coming in and smashing it. I allow myself a bit more time, get myself in and then take the game on.”

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