Dane van Niekerk: ‘My feet gave way, I heard a snap – that was my World Cup’

While many of the world’s leading cricketers will surf straight into the Women’s Hundred from the Commonwealth Games, match-honed and tournament-ready, Dane van Niekerk will be anything but. Since she lifted last year’s trophy as captain of the Oval Invincibles, the South African has played just 25 times and not at all since November, her year so far having been completely ruined by a freak dog-feeding accident just weeks before March’s World Cup.

“I do a lot of stupid things but probably that wasn’t one of the best decisions I could make so close to a World Cup,” Van Niekerk says. “Marizanne [Kapp, her wife and teammate with both South Africa and the Invincibles] always tells me I’m a loose head. It was an honest, freak accident. It was raining and I was on the wooden deck outside the house. I needed to go down to feed my dogs and I tried to climb down from the edge, and as I did that my feet gave way. I heard a snap, and I knew straight away that was my World Cup.

“I still hate myself to this day. If I’d just made one split-second decision different I could have been there and maybe helped my team, made a bit of a difference. That is life and that’s how I learn.”

One phrase in Van Niekerk’s description of her accident stands out. She made her international debut at 15 and 13 years later stands 20 away from being South Africa’s leading women’s T20 run-scorer, sits No 3 on the list of her country’s leading wicket-takers in both women’s T20s and ODIs (Kapp is No 2 in both formats) and is a hugely respected captain. It seems jarring that such a brilliant and successful sportsperson so casually, and for such seemingly trivial reasons, admits to feelings of self-loathing.

“I’m my worst critic, and my worst enemy sometimes as