Ayabonga Khaka

In 2024, Ayabonga Khaka became the first Black African woman to play 100 ODIs for South Africa. The enormity of the occasion must not have been lost on a player who has always stood out wherever she has gone.

Khaka started playing cricket at school in Middledrift as the only girl in a boys' team, at the age of seven. She continued playing competitively in secondary school, and since then, has gone up the ranks steadily, making her international debut in 2012 during a white-ball series in Bangladesh.

She has more than 180 white-ball wickets to her name, and her economy rate right through this period has been remarkable. The big match figures did not come to her as often as they might have for other bowlers - she only got her first ODI five-for in 2022, against West Indies, in a match-defining spell - but she has always been a reliable presence when the side has looked for for control.

This was exemplified during her metronomic spells in South Africa's run to the final of the 2024 T20 World Cup: she might have taken just four wickets in six innings, but her economy rate of 6.23 was a big contributor.