South Africa

Cricket in South Africa carried the country's divisions for decades before one body could speak for all of it: a United Cricket Board of South Africa formed in 1991, drawing together structures that had been kept apart, and Cricket South Africa took over the administration in 2002. Its first Test came in March 1889, against England at St George's Park in Port Elizabeth, and the International Cricket Council granted it Full Member status in 1909.

The Proteas, as they are known today, have never settled on a single ground. Matches rotate between Newlands in Cape Town, the Wanderers in Johannesburg, whose 34,000 capacity makes it the largest of the three, and Kingsmead in Durban.

Their one global title came early and under an older name: the 1998 ICC KnockOut Trophy, won against the West Indies. South Africa lost the 2023 Cricket World Cup final to Australia, and has now been beaten in three separate T20 World Cup finals, in 2009, 2012 and 2024.

Jacques Kallis remains the player the record books keep returning to: 13,289 Test runs and 575 wickets in the same format. He added a further 11,579 runs in one-day internationals. Dale Steyn's 439 Test wickets stand beside that tally as the side's sharpest attacking weapon.

South Africa has reached four finals in fifteen years.