Sixteen Fours, Four Sixes, One Wicket Lost: Wolvaardt's 126 Seals the Series in Bulawayo

Laura Wolvaardt hit sixteen fours and four sixes at Queens Sports Club. That is 88 runs in boundaries alone, in an innings of 126 not out that lasted 62 balls. South Africa Women made 200 for 1 in their twenty overs, and the one wicket they lost fell with 27 on the board.

For the rest of the evening the scorecard read like a formality, and it was. Annerie Dercksen took 5 for 15, Zimbabwe Women were bowled out for 120 in the twentieth over, and South Africa won by 80 runs to go 3-0 up in the five-match series. After a six-wicket win and a 64-run win, the margins have only grown.

Tendai Makusha removed Miane Smit for 8 with South Africa on 27 in the third over, and that was the last success Zimbabwe had with the ball. Wolvaardt and Karabo Meso batted the remaining 103 balls together and added 173 without being separated.

The shape of that stand is worth a look. Meso made 50 from 51 balls; Wolvaardt made 126 from 62. One batter rotated, the other attacked, and neither needed to do the other's job. It is the simplest way to build a big T20 total and one of the hardest to execute, because it asks the anchor to be content with a supporting role while her partner gets the headlines. Meso was content, and South Africa got to 200.

Zimbabwe used seven bowlers. Nyasha Gwanzura's four overs for 25 were the tidiest; Makusha, who took the only wicket, went for 48 in hers.

The chase was effectively over inside eight overs. Zimbabwe lost their first wicket in the first over, were 25 for 3 at the end of the fifth, and 35 for 6 in the eighth. Lorraine Pemhiwa was run out without facing a ball, Beloved Biza was out hit wicket, and by the end of the innings Dercksen had five wickets for 15 from her four overs. Nyasha Gwanzura's 28 from 23 balls, with six fours, was the only resistance at the top.

What followed deserves more than a footnote. Michelle Mavunga, batting at No. 9, made 41 from 23 balls with eight fours — the highest score of the innings — and Christine Mutasa added 19 from 19. Zimbabwe went from 62 for 7 to 113 for 8, and they batted into the final over. As in the second T20I, Zimbabwe's lower order showed more fight than the top.

Our preview described Queens Sports Club as a surface with true bounce, and 320 runs in 39.3 overs suggests the ball came on well enough for anyone who got in. It was also a surface on which bowlers who hit good areas were rewarded: South Africa bowled three maidens in the match, Dercksen, Nzuza and Hlubi one each, and all seven South African bowlers went at under nine an over. The contrast between the innings was less about the pitch than about partnerships — South Africa had one unbroken stand across the last seventeen overs, and Zimbabwe's best was 51.

Wolvaardt's 126 not out came from 62 balls with sixteen fours and four sixes, and she was there from the first over to the last. In the second T20I she fell lbw for 10; two days later she batted through the full twenty overs and more than doubled Zimbabwe Women's best partnership on her own.

Our match preview called her the most elegant batter in the women's game, which is the sort of thing previews say. On Tuesday she made it look like a description rather than a compliment — the ball arriving, the bat meeting it, the fielder turning to watch it go, sixteen times over.

The lean: correct. Both the blog preview and the match page leaned towards South Africa, on the grounds that the quality gap was real and that Wolvaardt's batting alone should be enough to challenge Zimbabwe's attack. South Africa won by 80 runs.

Player to watch: exactly right. We named Laura Wolvaardt for South Africa. She made 126 not out and was Player of the Match. For Zimbabwe we declined to name anyone, pointing instead to the emerging players who might announce themselves — Michelle Mavunga's 41 from 23 at No. 9 is the closest this match came to that.

What we got wrong. The preview was written as though the series might still be alive, calling this match a potential decider; South Africa were already 2-0 up and have now won it. We also put Marizanne Kapp at the centre of South Africa's all-round threat. She does not appear on the bowling card, and only three South Africans batted, while Annerie Dercksen — not mentioned in either preview — took five wickets.

The series is decided, but two T20Is remain, on September 17 and September 19. For South Africa, those matches are a chance to give time to the players who have not yet needed to bat — only three did here.

For Zimbabwe Women the target is specific. In each of the last two matches their top order has not yet given the lower order a platform, and the lower order — Mutasa and Sibanda in the second T20I, Mavunga here — has kept having to salvage the innings instead. A total that stays competitive into the last five overs, not just past 100, would be real progress from Bulawayo.