Ismail is an elite athlete who will only be missed now that she’s gone

Shabnim Ismail was always there. She took the new ball. She bowled fast. She’d celebrate with fury and joy, but mostly fury. She’d give an opponent a send-off. 

Ismail operated differently to most of her teammates, providing aggression that those watching a women’s game for the first time and with a mentality stuck in the 1950s might feel was “unbecoming for a girl”.

Vernon Philander, commentating for SuperSport while Ismail was bowling in a series against the West Indies last year, recalled playing “street cricket” with her. The pair grew up in neighbouring suburbs north of Cape Town; Philander in Ravensmead, Ismail in Cravenby. “We made teams where the avenues played each other and she was a fierce competitor. She was a couple years younger than the rest of us, but she made it known she was there to compete,” Philander recalled. 

That fierce competitiveness, along with her ability to bowl fast, never left her. In fact she turned that package into an international career that left an indelible mark on South African cricket. Ismail was part of the revolutionary era for women’s cricket in this country. She bridged the period between amateur cricket, where barely anyone in the country knew there was a women’s Proteas team, to what exists now — professionalism, national contracts, commercial opportunities and life-changing deals resulting from lucrative franchise leagues. 

It’s the latter that has allowed Ismail to hang up her Proteas boots five months before her 35th birthday. Could she have continued as an international player? Consider this: in February, with England on 53/0 after five overs and well on top in the T20 World Cup semifinal, chasing SA’s 166, Ismail bowled an over in which five deliveries topped 120km/h, one of which hit 128km/h — the fastest ball ever recorded in women’s cricket. She didn’t do that in any old ODI or T20 match, she did it when her country needed it most, and in bowling that over, picked up two wickets and crucially changed the momentum of the match the Proteas’ way. History followed. 

That was Ismail. Driven to excellence at every turn, determined, as she’d shown Philander on the streets of Cravenby, to ensure everyone knew she was there and not just to make up the numbers, but to compete and to guarantee the boys remembered her. 

Her international career was the same. As part of the generation that led South African women’s cricket into the professional era, it wasn’t enough for Ismail that the Proteas just made up the numbers. There was little point, said former captain Dane van Niekerk, in just being at a World Cup, South African had to learn to want to win the competition. 

Van Niekerk, Ismail and Marizanne Kapp led that change in attitude. That Van Niekerk, after being made captain in 2016, was able to call on Kapp and Ismail with the new ball helped to provide the rest of the team with tangible proof of the new mentality.

Kapp and Ismail were an exceptional combination; aggressive, accurate and always successful. 

Kapp wasn’t as quick (no-one was), but she bowled that nagging line and length with the outswinger, a devastating weapon. Ismail had the pace, but saying that is all she had would be an insult to the tremendous skill she developed in her career that saw her able to get excellent seam movement, bowl a truly scary bouncer, while her slower ball was a crafty addition.

Her 317 international wickets underline one element of her greatness. However, add to that the fact that she was at the forefront of the change in profile for the women’s game in this country and it elevates her status not only as one of SA’s best cricketers, but one of the nation’s elite athletes. 

Shabnim Ismail will be missed.