Laura Wolvaardt's evolution: How the World Cup transformed the Proteas Women's captain

South Africa lost to India by 52 runs in the 2025 ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup final on Sunday. However, South Africa will come out as a totally different team from the campaign they had in India.

The evolution has already started, and it started right at the top with captain Laura Wolvaardt. Before this tournament, Wolvaardt had a very limited game with the bat in ODI cricket, often taking the conservative route.

However, in this tournament, particularly in the last two games - the semi-final and the final in which she scored back-to-back centuries - Wolvaardt has looked a totally different player.

The right-hander went from being a predominantly off-side stroke-maker to a well-rounded player who could smash it on the leg side when the game situation demanded.

Following the loss to India, Wolvaardt fronted up to the media and emphasised how she challenged herself to be more attacking and positive in the showpiece event.

“I think my ODI cricket has come a long way in this tournament. To win games, you've got to be nice and positive and aggressive. And I've really tried to sort of explore that a bit in this tournament,” Wolvaardt told the media on Sunday.

“I think it hasn't been my best year in ODI cricket. I was maybe a bit too conservative or one-dimensional. So, I'm really happy with the different options that I was able to bring in throughout this tournament.

“I think today I scored quite a lot of leg-side runs or a few leg-side boundaries, which is something I've been working on to open up different spaces because they stack the offside and dot me up there. 

“I’ve been trying. I think in T20 cricket, it's options that I use, but not necessarily in ODI cricket. So I'm happy I was able to bring some of that in.”

Not only did Wolvaardt evolve out in the middle with the bat in hand, but also with the captaincy hat on.

She has had to dig the team out of the deep hole they were in following the 10-wicket defeat to England in their tournament opener, to winning five games in a row and beating England in the ODI World Cup semi-final for the first time.

Reflecting on her leadership in the tournament, Wolvaardt pointed out her working relationship with Mandla Mashimbyi as the reason behind her growth as a leader.

“I think as a leader, I've worked well with coach Mandla. I think we complement each other pretty well,” she said.

“I think just bouncing back from that game (against England) was really good from the group. I think just the resilience that we're able to show as a team has been pretty big. So, I think I'm glad we were able to reset the squad after those games and to get us all the way to the final.”

Despite the loss, Wolvaardt believes they were in the run chase to the very end following her innings of 101 off 98 deliveries.

“I think we were pretty neck and neck with them when they showed the updates on the scoreboard. I thought my partnership with Dercksen was pretty big. I thought we were going to take it through to the end,” said Wolvaardt. 

“But then she just got out right as we were trying to launch into the back ten. And then I went out too soon after.

“I still thought Chloe and Nadine could do it together. I think we left Nadine a little bit too much to do by herself. But, I think we were right in that game for a lot of it.”