Proteas women do country proud

In the macho way we bring up boys to play sport, the biggest dig you can use to inspire them is to tell them: “You’re playing like a girl.”

After the Proteas women’s team went down fighting on Tuesday in the ICC Women’s World Cup semifinal, we would suggest, without wanting to be facetious, that perhaps if more of our national sporting teams emulated these women, we’d be doing a lot better on the international stage.

Women’s cricket in this country has gone, in a single tournament, from being a curiosity and pub chuckling point for the boys, to a sporting code we can all be proud of.

And as Cricket SA chief executive Haroon Lorgat noted, that the Proteas women came so close – they went down to the second-last ball of the 50-over innings against England – was a “heartbreaking” defeat for the team and their supporters.

A few years ago, we would not have dreamed of being able to compete with England, one of the world’s top sides, let alone push them right to the wire in a tournament semifinal.

This is a victory for the team, a victory for South Africa and a victory for sportswomen in our country.

They’ve earned their respect.