By Caroline Chepkorir

In the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup competition, South Africa has so far scored the highest. South Africa skipper Laura Wolvaardt guided her team during a superb batting performance, which contributed to a total of 166-5 and a massive victory by 80 runs against Scotland at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium.

South Africa won the toss and decided to bat first. Proteas’ openers, Wolvaardt’s 40 of 27 balls and Tazmin Brits 43 in 35 deliveries, which included five boundaries and one maximum, laid the foundation for the team; later, Marizanne Kapp ignited the game with an impressive 43 from only 24 deliveries.

In reply, Scotland struggled with the ball and the field, but they lost both their opener for a run skipper, Kathryn Byrce, in the powerplay. Later, Alisa Lister and Priyanaz Chaterji left the field. In the 9th over, the scoreboard was at 45/6.

Ayabonga Khaka dismissed Sakia Horley 6 and Chloe Tryon picked up both of the Bryce sisters, Sarah for 5 and Kathryn for 7, which left Scotland’s middle order crushed.

“It was a pretty convincing win for South Africa in the end; I thought that they batted well and bowled well, and I think this is the challenge for us; we’re at the next level now, and we need to go away from these games and take the learnings,” said Priyanaz Chatterji, according to Cricket Scotland.

“We’re a resilient group, and losing is part of cricket; it’s part of high-performance sport, and I think the best teams go away, learn, and move forward. It’s always disappointing to lose, and to lose like that isn’t fun, but I thought they did play very well,” she added.

The result moves South Africa to the top of Group B, two points clear of the West Indies and ahead of England on net rate.

“It was excellent from us all-round; I couldn’t have asked for much more from my team. We wanted to be ruthless and show what we could do in all aspects, so I’m very happy with how we did that,” said South Africa captain Laura Wolvaardt, as quoted by BBC Sports.