Ken Borland

Peter Siddle would like nothing better than to chop through South Africa's top-order.

Fast bowler Peter Siddle was a competitive woodchopper at school in Gippsland, the large rural area east of Melbourne, a quintessentially Australian pursuit that one can safely say does not feature in the extramural activities of many South African schools.

His parents gave him his first axe when he was just two years old and, although he is no longer a woodchopper, Siddle brings many of the strengths he learnt from those days into Australia’s favourite summer sport.

He goes at batsmen with the same aggression, he is indefatigable and, despite being a lean machine who has converted to a vegan diet, has considerable strength and stamina.

And the 29-year-old has plenty of character too: His tussles with the South African batsmen in the summer of 2008/9 were epic viewing and the Wanderers crowd chanting “Siddle is … a wanker” remain fresh in the memory. Apart from his undoubted qualities as a bowler, there is something of the pantomime villain about Siddle, who is a most likeable fellow off the field.

“I think we’re similar to the South Africans in that we do play aggressively. Intimidation can work against anyone, we’re fortunate to have someone like Mitchell Johnson, and at those speeds, batting is hard work whatever the conditions,” Siddle says.

Siddle will be one of the star attractions of the thrilling late summer that lies ahead, but, having played 51 Tests now, he is a clever bowler these days. He has erred in the past by bowling too short too often, but Siddle now tends to keep the ball full and straight and uses a swift, well-directed bouncer as a nasty surprise.

Australia’s slide began after that 2008/9 home and away series against South Africa and a couple of coaches have paid the price for their indifferent form. A 5-0 whitewash of England suggests they may have turned the corner, but the opposition did throw in the towel in feeble fashion and South Africa at home should provide a real test of their new order under Darren Lehmann and Michael Clarke.

They certainly seem a more settled outfit.

“As a whole, the team is a lot more suited to our plans now. We’ve come a long way, with a couple of personnel changes, we’ve got back to a couple of older boys in the bowling attack. The Ashes showed how far we’ve come,” Siddle says.

“We need to stay a lot more patient, with both bat and ball. We’ve bowled very consistently as a group, Nathan Lyon has done so well at the other end and the three quicks have been able to bowl fast, short spells.”

Siddle chuckles at the suggestion that the English batsmen were soft and says the Australians know the South African batting line-up is a formidable one, but plans have been set in place.

“We know it’s going to be a tough series, we’re going to have to be consistent over four or five days, building pressure and not letting them get away with partnerships.

“It makes us a bit more happy that Jacques Kallis won’t be there because his record speaks for itself. He’s one of the greats and, although it’s disappointing not to play against him, it’s a nice feeling not having to bowl at him!

“But there are still plenty of others to take his place and we’re going to have to work hard, South Africa are number one for a reason. Like Faf du Plessis, who gave us a really tough day in Adelaide 18 months ago. That showed the character of the player, he enjoys the challenge. But we have a bit more understanding of him now and I’ve no doubt we have good plans to bowl to him,” Siddle says.

Siddle said talk that South African pitches were different to those they were used to Australia was wide of the mark.

“The Gabba, Melbourne to an extent and Hobart are all very similar to here with the ball moving around. But it’s still about bowling the right line and length and I think we’ve achieved that in the last six months,” he says.

The eater of 15 bananas a day is famous for the tight line he employs just outside off stump, with the occasional mean delivery banged in [he famously hit Gautam Gambhir on the head with his first ball in Test cricket], and seems to thrive on the hard, unglamorous work of Test bowling.

His batting has also improved markedly and last March he became the first number nine batsman in Test history to score a half-century in each innings of a Test, against India on a turning track in Delhi.

The Victorian who took a hat-trick against England on his 26^th birthday is the archetypal determined Aussie and the three-Test series is definitely the better for having him in it.

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Those people who have portrayed the Knights as a franchise in freefall have ignored the valid reasons, and gross misfortune, which afflicted their performances this summer, according to chief executive officer Johan van Heerden.

The Knights finished fifth in the Sunfoil Series, winning just two of their 10 matches, and fourth in the Momentum One-Day Cup, winning three of their 10 games. But those figures fail to take into account the horrendous run of injuries and bad weather that stalked the central franchise almost throughout the season.

Living in Bloemfontein or Kimberley, one doesn’t expect prolonged bouts of rain, but the Knights had two home One-Day Cup matches abandoned without a ball being bowled, leaving them an agonising one point short of a playoff place.

In the four-day competition, the Knights opened their campaign by having the better of a draw against the defending champion Titans in Kimberley, but then had matches washed out on successive weekends in Paarl, Pietermaritzburg and East London.

Once they could get on the field, the Knights were actually in reasonable form and, strangely enough, the only two Sunfoil Series matches they lost were in Bloemfontein, against the Warriors and the Cape Cobras.

As if the weather was not a bad enough blow to the hopes of the franchise, it also suffered an extraordinary run of injuries.

Morne van Wyk scored a century and Reeza Hendricks a half-century in that opening match against the Titans, but it would be the last game they played as the veteran wicketkeeper/batsman badly injured his shoulder and the young top-order prospect broke his ankle.

With Dean Elgar often on national duties, it meant the Knights had lost almost their entire first-choice top-order.

“Serious injuries hit us. We had the whole season planned but then we had to go without key players like Morne van Wyk and Reeza Hendricks. Those are quality players who are extremely important to our set-up,” Van Heerden said.

“Unfortunately, their replacements were not able to front up and Rilee Rossouw and Obus Pienaar became our most senior batsmen. But they are still struggling with things in their own games and that’s why we were 25 for four too often. If the other top-four batsmen had been there, it would have taken the pressure off them.”

Pace bowlers Quinton Friend and Dillon du Preez also suffered injuries at inopportune times, and Ryan McLaren was also often absent with the national team.

But the good news after a tough season in Bloemfontein and Kimberley is that all but two of their players have opted for the safety of renewing their contracts with the Knights.

Unfortunately, the two players leaving are both batsmen – Van Wyk and Ryan Bailey.

Van Wyk has been a great servant of Knights cricket and is the franchise’s leading run-scorer with over 4000 runs, but he will be relocating to Durban.

“Morne has never left Bloemfontein, he never played county cricket, and he believes he has maybe two years left in his career, so he just wants to play in a different area,” Van Heerden explained.

And Bailey, whose double-century in the opening round of Sunfoil Series matches accounted for over half of his total runs and he only managed 71 runs in six innings in the One-Day Cup, declined a one-year contract from the Knights and will take up a two-year offer from the Eastern Cape Warriors instead.

These departures – and the fact that the likes of Johan van der Wath and Du Preez are also coming to the end of their careers – would be a real pain in the neck for Van Heerden, were it not for the really cosy situation the Knights are in in terms of the talent coming through just below franchise level.

The Free State team have excelled in the amateur competitions, mounting a strong challenge in the three-day league, reaching the final of the one-day tournament and making an unbeaten start to the T20s.

The likes of Gihahn Cloete, Rudi Second, Michael Erlank, Patrick Botha and Corne Dry have already featured in the Knights team, while Pite van Biljon, Duanne Olivier, Keagan Rafferty and Romano Terblanche are waiting in the wings.

“The youngsters can see that there are spots opening up for them and the policy of the board is that if two players are on an equal footing, then we go for the younger player. We have a youth policy for the franchise and we want to lure youngsters here, we have great arrangements for that in place with the University of the Free State and the Central University of Technology,” Van Heerden said.

An example of this is the Ewie and Hansie Cronje Project which provides a bursary for a promising cricketer and student to study at UFS.

“The bursary pays for three years’ study and pocket money and their equipment is paid for too. They must be athletic and have the potential to study further, because we believe people who qualify with a degree become better decision-makers.

“It provides specialised training and physical monitoring for young fast bowlers and it was the idea of Paul Harris [the top banker], especially the scientific side, and he has funded it along with Johann Rupert and Rembrandt,” Van Heerden explained.

The excellent schools in the region are still providing the talent, with Diego Rosier and Rafferty being recent SA U19 captains and either of them could be playing for the Knights next summer.

The mood is certainly positive in the central region, despite the hardships of the last summer and the bigger picture is healthy, according to Van Heerden.

With all the varieties of delivery being bowled today – and the pressure to develop them – spinners these days run the risk of falling foul of the International Cricket Council’s rules on fair actions and specifically the 15 degree stipulation.

Sunfoil Dolphins off-spinner Prenelan Subrayen was the latest to be reported for a suspicious action, leading to remedial work and a rapid return to the field for the KwaZulu-Natal side, the 19-year-old playing an important role in their Ram Slam T20 Challenge campaign.

Subrayen’s problems started last August when he went to the ICC U19 World Cup in Australia. His action came under scrutiny after he played all six of South Africa’s matches on their way to the semi-finals, taking seven wickets at an average of just 14.42 and conceding only 2.43 runs per over.

Tests by both the Australian Institute of Sport and the Sports Science Institute of South Africa deemed Subrayen’s action to be illegal and in December he was sent back to his province to undergo rehabilitation.

The doosra is normally the delivery that causes problems, but in the case of Subrayen, it was his changes of pace that caused his elbow to bend beyond 15 degrees when bowling.

“I have the leggie, but no I don’t have the doosra. I only have three different balls and it was my variation of pace that was causing my elbow to bend,” Subrayen said.

The youngster took what is quite probably the worst news a bowler can get in his stride, and the fact that he was able to play for his club and the Dolphins side in the Franchise Cubs Week as a specialist batsman made all the difference.

“It was a shock, but not in a bad way. I took it as positive criticism and it made me work harder. I’ve had issues before, I’ve been tested before and it helped in a big way that I was still able to play as a batsman. I wasn’t totally torn away from the cricket field and I was able to keep my mind fresh and in the game,” Subrayen said.

Dolphins coach Lance Klusener, who worked with assistant coach Rivash Gobind and former Natal coach Phil Russell in rectifying Subrayen’s action, said the fact that the Glenwood High School product is so mature and has a very good understanding of his action ensured that the process took less than two months.

“Prenelan’s extremely mature for a 19-year-old and he knows exactly how his body works in terms of his action. That made the corrective work much easier and enabled the problem to get sorted ASAP.

“Normally it only happens when a bowler is 25 or 26 that they work out how their body feels, whether they’re falling over or not, whether they can self-correct or not. I get the feeling that Prenelan can already do that,” Klusener said.

After spending some time under the watchful eye of the trio of KZN coaches, Subrayen then travelled to Cape Town with the Dolphins as the 12^th man for a four-day game against the Cobras, allowing High Performance Manager Vincent Barnes the chance to work with him and give the go-ahead for the Verulam lad to be tested again.

“Initially the testing is done at their home base with every bowling session being videoed and every change being monitored. You can’t do it with the naked eye, you have to go back and compare the videos. The High Performance staff then work with the bowler for four to six days and when we think he’s ready for the final test, only then do we use the better cameras at the Sports Science Institute in Cape Town,” Barnes said.

“The bowler has to groove his new action, he has to learn it, he has to feel it,” the former Proteas bowling coach said.

“It wasn’t something very difficult to change, it was more about my feet positioning. The younger you are, the better you can change because as you get older, you get more used to your illegal action,” Subrayen said.

Apart from the hard work of Klusener, Gobind, Russell and Barnes, as well as previous input from specialist spin coaches Shafiek Abrahams and Paul Adams, Subrayen said he couldn’t have sailed through the process without the support of his parents, especially father Kugan, the Level III-certified head coach of Verulam Cricket Club.

But it clearly helps that Subrayen is a player who understands his action so well and Klusener has high hopes for his young charge.

“He potentially has 20 years of spin bowling left and he’s exceptionally talented. He knows what he wants to achieve and he’s a good batsman too, people will see that in time. The key is that he knows what he’s doing with the ball,” Klusener said.

The Subrayen case was complicated by the badly dislocated shoulder he suffered several years ago, but with the shoulder now at pretty much 100%, the jerkiness in his action gone and the experience from the hard school of knocks adding to the natural talent he undoubtedly has, the future is bright for the disciplined, but passionate youngster.

Jacques Faul is the new chief executive of Titans cricket, taking over from acting appointee Aniel Soma, who covered so efficiently in the wake of Elise Lombard’s tragic passing.

It may be considered a step down in some quarters for Faul, who was the acting CEO of Cricket South Africa for a year, but it is a return to franchise cricket that the former Western Transvaal player is excited about.

“I learnt a lot while I was with CSA, it was difficult, but we achieved what we set out to do, which was keeping the operations going and getting the sponsors back. It has also given me a more balanced view of cricket administration, having always been on the affiliate’s side of the fence before then. I wanted to stay in cricket and I want to make the Titans the best franchise in the world. It’s a fantastic organisation and I’m very privileged,” Faul said.

It has not been the best of timing for Faul with the Titans’ awful season a blow to their reputation as one of the country’s leading franchises. But the former North-West CEO has no doubts he can help get the amalgamation of the Northerns and Easterns cricket unions back up to the top.

“I want to take the organisation to a new level, but you can only react in four ways strategically when you move into a venture, and this applies from a pub to an accounting firm. You can stop, start, continue or change things.

“The Titans is a great organisation, so I’ll be continuing a lot of things. But my role demands that I stop, start and change certain things. Issues such as stadia and financial stability are always dynamic,” Faul said.

Faul played a major role in elevating the status of cricket in Potchefstroom when he became CEO in 2003, but he was actually brought up in Klerksdorp, where he played club cricket for 21 years and was elected president of the club when he was just 26.

Had he not been called into administration at such a young age, and shown such commercial vision, Faul might well have ended up coaching.

He has a Level III certificate and an academy at Klerksdorp High School and describes coaching as “what I enjoy most”.