Awesome opportunity: Proteas women excited for rare Test against England

Though she admits they would like to play more Test cricket, Proteas women captain Laura Wolvaardt says her team are excited to face England in a rare four-day match in Bloemfontein starting on Sunday.

The SA team will play their first home Test since 2002, and only their fourth game in the format for the last 10 years.

“I absolutely love Test cricket. I think it’s the purest form of the game and to be able to play this format is always an awesome opportunity,” Wolvaardt said ahead of the match.

“I’m definitely going to enjoy every second of the game, and I would love to have way more of it on the calendar, but unfortunately we don’t get to play that often. But just being exposed to it is amazing.”

Limited preparation

With a quick turnaround after the ODI series against England which concluded earlier this week, Wolvaardt said they hadn’t been able to prepare for the four-day game as well as they would have liked.

She was pleased, however, that her squad had a chance to test themselves in a format which would demand for them to be at their best.

“You have to be technically pretty sound to last a long time in Test cricket,” the skipper said, “so it really tests you for long periods of time and tests your all-round skills as a cricketer, which is pretty cool.”

The first day’s play in the one-off Test between SA and England starts at 10am at Mangaung Oval on Sunday.