Sinalo Jafta is a South African professional cricketer born on 22 December 1994 in East London.
She hails from a small town outside East London called Butterworth in the Eastern Cape and plays as a wicket-keeper and right-handed batter for the South Africa women’s national team, known as the Proteas.
Raised by her single mother, Lumka Jafta, a school teacher, she grew up in a household that supported her sporting ambitions despite limited resources.
Inspired as a child by watching Makhaya Ntini and Mark Boucher on television, she initially pursued hockey and athletics before taking up cricket at the age of 13.
Jafta has spoken openly about overcoming personal challenges, including a battle with alcohol addiction that led her to enter rehabilitation in October 2022.
She emerged sober and has since established herself as a mainstay in the national side across formats while also founding the SJ10 Foundation to support grassroots cricket for young girls and initiatives around menstrual health and education.
Siblings
Sinalo has a younger brother named Nika Bija.
In early 2023 she described him as then 16 turning 17 and one of her biggest motivators, noting that she wants to make him proud every day even if he does not fully realise it.
Her mother, Lumka Jafta, raised both Sinalo and her brother on a teacher’s salary as a single parent, providing emotional support through her cricket career and personal recovery.
In a year-end reflection posted in late 2025, Jafta also referred to witnessing her sister get married that year, alongside watching her brother “become indoda” (a traditional coming-of-age milestone) and reuniting with family.
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Career
Jafta’s domestic career began in the 2010/11 season with Border, followed by stints with North West, a return to Border, Western Province, and later Central Gauteng.
She made her Women’s One Day International debut for South Africa against New Zealand on 22 October 2016.
Her T20I debut came against Pakistan on 15 May 2019, and she earned her Test cap against England on 27 June 2022.
She received a national contract from Cricket South Africa ahead of the 2020–21 season and captained the South African Emerging Women’s squad on a tour of Bangladesh in 2021.
Jafta featured in the 2022 Women’s Cricket World Cup in New Zealand, the cricket tournament at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, and multiple ICC events thereafter.
She has been a regular in the squad for T20 World Cups, including the 2023 edition hosted in South Africa where the team reached the final, the 2024 tournament in the UAE, and the 2025 ODI World Cup.
Known for her energetic presence behind the stumps, sharp glove work, and ability to contribute lower-order runs, she has taken numerous catches and stumpings across formats while batting primarily in the middle to lower order.
In recent years she has also expanded into media, including commentary work.
Accolades
Among her notable team achievements, Jafta was part of the South Africa side that finished as runners-up at the 2023 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup on home soil, the 2024 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup in the UAE, and the 2025 ICC Cricket World Cup in India.
She also contributed to the silver medal-winning effort at the 2022 Commonwealth Games.
Individually, she received the Makhaya Ntini Power of Cricket Award at the Cricket South Africa Awards, an honour recognising resilience, humility, and the transformative power of sport both on and off the field.
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