Khaya Zondo is an aggressive middle-order batsman whose cricketing career had an early start through one of South Africa's most renowned junior programs. Bakers Mini Cricket brought through the likes of Mark Boucher and AB de Villiers, and Zondo also began there, in the Lindelani Township 20 kilometres outside Durban. His mother was running the program in the area and Zondo was among her charges.

He honed his skills at Westville Boys High and joined a Premier League club Pinetown at the age of 15. Zondo was part of Kwa-Zulu Natal's age-group provincial sides at under-13, u-15, u-17 and u-19 level and was just 17 years old when he made his first-class debut for Kwa-Zulu Natal's provincial side in November 2007. Two months later, he debuted for Dolphins, Durban's franchise team.

He bounced between the provincial side and the franchise team, where he found it difficult to hold down a spot. In the 2011-12 season, Zondo was picked to be part of a seventh domestic franchise, Impi, a team made up of players like him who were on the fringes of teams and competed in the domestic T20 competition. He was their top scorer with 259 runs from 11 games, which included a century against Cobras.
Firdose Moonda

Zondo made more regular appearances for Dolphins after that, across all formats, and in the 2013-14 season was the second highest run-scorer for the franchise in the first-class competition - 541 runs at 38.64 with two centuries. He was picked for the South Africa A side's tour of India in July-August 2015 and was their second highest run-scorer in a triangular series, which also included Australia A. Zondo's 154 runs at 38.50 in four matches earned him a maiden international call-up for South Africa's tour to India in October 2015, where he was named in the T20 squad as a replacement for the injured Rilee Rossouw.