Ken Borland

South Africa captain Temba Bavuma says the success of their Champions Trophy campaign hangs on how well they bat in good batting conditions in Pakistan.

And the Proteas skipper is heartened by the good form most of his batsmen have shown in the ongoing SA20, which concludes on February 8, nearly two weeks before they open their Champions Trophy campaign against Afghanistan in Karachi on February 21.

David Miller has not only captained Paarl Royals to the top of the log and a place in the playoffs already, he is averaging 91.50 with the bat at a strike-rate of 134. Rassie van der Dussen is averaging 50.40 for MI Cape Town, while his opening partner Ryan Rickelton has been restricted to just four innings due to a hamstring strain, but has passed 50 twice in that time.

Aiden Markram is leading from the front for Sunrisers Eastern Cape, averaging 40.50 at a strike-rate of 138, while all-rounder Marco Jansen averages 32.80 at a strike-rate of 131 for the same team.

Even key finisher Heinrich Klaasen found some form in his last game as he plundered 66 off 43 balls for Durban Super Giants against high-flying MI Cape Town at Newlands.

Miller (6^th), Van der Dussen (3^rd), Rickelton (7^th), Markram (4^th) and Jansen (10^th) are in the top-10 run-scorers list.

“I’m really glad that the core of our batting line-up is doing well in the SA20. In Pakistan we should get friendly pitches for batting, so you need in-form batsmen so that you can take control of matches over there,” Bavuma told sportsboom.co.za.

Interviewed as one of the celebrity guests for a South African Breweries function, Bavuma did, however, admit that the loss of several high-profile Proteas bowlers to injury was concerning. Gerald Coetzee, Anrich Nortje and Daryn Dupavillon, who has played two ODIs, were all recently ruled out of the SA20 tournament, while Nandre Burger, Lizaad Williams and Beuran Hendricks were all forced to withdraw before the event started.

Lungi Ngidi last played on January 18 and has been surrounded by a fitness cloud for most of the summer. He and Nortje were both named in South Africa’s original Champions Trophy squad. No replacement has yet been named for Nortje, with coach Rob Walter hoping Coetzee will recover in time from his hamstring strain.

“There are more question marks over the bowling, but obviously injuries are part of the game,” Bavuma said. “Bowling has always been our strength and you want to be in the position where you can select from everyone. But I have a lot of pride in this team that they always find a way, even if they have to do it the hard way. These sort of injury questions are nothing new.”

Bavuma is probably entitled to feel it will all be okay once they hit the big stage in Pakistan due to the tenacity his team have shown previously. After a torrid start to the World Test Championship, they have regrouped and qualified for the final against Australia in June.

“That this team always seems to find a way speaks to the character and environment in the squad, you are allowed to be yourselves. There have been lots of positives in the last year and the team has been successful in making the Test final.

“We ticked that box, that is a step in the right direction, but we are not at the end of our journey, we still want to achieve more. But we’ve shown we can win away from home, even though we are an inexperienced side. It’s about managing the space. The youngsters have stepped up, the way they have reacted has definitely contributed to our success.

“We obviously want to continue in that vein, but we want to be a lot more disciplined because that will lead to excellence,” Bavuma said.

The Proteas will be able to ready themselves for the Champions Trophy in an ODI tri-series with Pakistan and New Zealand in Lahore and Karachi from February 8.

Tristan Stubbs, the 23-year-old Proteas batting prospect, has now been earmarked for the crucial number three position in the Test team, a crown prince following in the footsteps of South African greats like Hashim Amla and Jacques Kallis.

Amla scored 7993 runs at an average of 49.95 batting at number three for South Africa, the record, while Kallis, who scored the most runs overall for the Proteas, made the number four slot his own but established his career at first wicket down from 1997 to 2009, playing 49 Tests there and averaging 49.

Given that Stubbs has only played a single Test and just 18 first-class matches, it was a surprise when Proteas Test coach Shukri Conrad was emphatic that the Eastern Cape product would be the number three batsman going forward, starting with the two-Test series in the West Indies next month.

“It shows how highly I rate Tristan,” Conrad said after announcing the Test squad. “Technically, he is one of our best batsmen and I believe he is unfairly seen as just being a white-ball player. The way he came in under pressure in the T20 World Cup and commanded his space, he imprinted himself on games.

“He’s a helluva player, the type I want at the top of the order. He has all the makings of a top-class number three. We have eight Tests in this cycle, so he will get a really good run with one eye on the future. Some may say it’s a big call, but I don’t believe I’m throwing him in the deep end, I’m not giving him a task I don’t think he can handle,” a typically forthright Conrad said.

Players coming from the Eastern Cape are often of rural stock and typically have no airs and graces, it being a strong farming community. Stubbs fits the stereotype: humble but in no way doubting his ability to fulfil the responsibility Conrad has given him.

“Batting number three for the Test side is a huge opportunity and challenge and I’m very thankful to the coach for backing me,” Stubbs told sportsboom.com in an exclusive interview. “Any time someone praises you like that, you don’t ever want to let them down. But I’ve dealt with a lot of expectation in my career before.

“It’s going to be a completely new role for me, but I’m going to go out and enjoy it and I’m really optimistic that I’ll be ready for it when I get on the plane to the Caribbean next week,” Stubbs said from the Proteas training camp in Durban.

Stubbs’s performances in the T20 World Cup suggest he is certainly up for the challenge. While 165 runs in eight innings at a strike-rate of 101.22 are mediocre figures at face value, he played most of his innings on extremely testing pitches and was batting up the order. He had the highest batting average (33.00) for South Africa in the tournament and played a key role in their progress to the final.

“It was a different role for me because I’ve never come in before when the team has lost two quick wickets, batting in the powerplay, trying to see off the new ball. But I really enjoyed it, coming in in some really tough positions. I enjoy batting when it is tough,” Stubbs said.

A natural strokeplayer and a powerful hitter of the ball, it is not surprising that Stubbs has made his mark initially in white-ball cricket. But he has a top-class record in the four-day game, averaging 50.20.

The fact that his last red-ball innings was a landmark innings of 302 not out for Eastern Province against KwaZulu-Natal Inland in February in South Africa’s premier red-ball competition, and that he has a phenomenal conversion rate of going to his hundred five of the six times he has passed fifty, suggest he has the makings of a quality number three. And a great desire for big runs.

“I took a lot of confidence from that triple-century. Our coach, Robin Peterson, is always harping on about we mustn’t just score hundreds – that’s not good enough, we must score big centuries,” Stubbs said.

“I got to go in early [at 20 for two] and I was able to bat all day. In the last year or so, I’ve really tried to value my wicket more. I’m always looking to score, but I also want to be more consistent. So I’ve put a big emphasis on not getting out, and that’s in all formats, particularly T20. Before I would get in and then play a stupid shot to get out. Now I’m trying to bat until the last over.

“I probably take more confidence, though, from how I batted in New York during the T20 World Cup, because of how I reacted when I was under high pressure. I really enjoy batting, I joke with my mates that the only time I’ve been dismissed between 50 and a hundred in first-class cricket is when my team-mate ran me out! So I would probably love a five-day draw with both teams making 600 in the West Indies,” Stubbs said with a laugh.

While he admitted healing would be slow from their T20 World Cup final disappointment – “it hurts so much more because we had done so well before” – Stubbs has exciting new opportunities lying ahead of him that will help ease the pain.

A brilliant bowling display allowed Joburg Super Kings to restrict Paarl Royals to 150 for nine and captain Faf du Plessis then played the major batting role in them getting across the line with seven wickets and 13 balls to spare in their crucial SA20 match at the Wanderers on Thursday night.

Du Plessis produced a fabulous innings of 87 off just 55 balls, with four sixes and seven fiery sixes; even at the advanced age of 40 he remains a fine batsman, innovator and a wonderful striker of the ball.

It was a vital win for the Super Kings, who were under pressure, lying fourth, just one point ahead of their neighbours and vanquishers earlier this week, Pretoria Capitals. Joburg are now up to third, level on 19 points with Sunrisers Eastern Cape, ahead of them on nett run-rate, both teams having won at home in their head-to-head clash.

That pressure now moves across on to the Pretoria Capitals, who really need to win, preferably with a bonus point, against MI Cape Town at Centurion on Friday. Sunrisers Eastern Cape then host the Paarl Royals on Saturday in a must-win game for the two-time defending champions.

With only eight of 24 matches this season being won by the team batting first, Du Plessis had little hesitation in bowling first after he won the toss. Sam Hain, the replacement at the top of the order for the marvellous Joe Root, did not last the first over.

Part-time off-spinner Donavan Ferreira was opening the bowling and Hain tried to hammer his second delivery down the ground, but there were early signs of turn and the ball was dragged to cow corner.

Lutho Sipamla must be rapidly developing into the apple of Du Plessis’ eye, having been brought into the Super Kings squad as a late replacement due to the five frontline bowlers they have lost to injury. The Proteas seamer was again pivotal on Thursday, taking three for 19 in his four outstanding overs, starting with the wicket of the new sensation, Lhuan-dre Pretorius, for 19 off 11 balls.

Sipamla also plucked out Keith Dudgeon (1) and Bjorn Fortuin (12) and now has 11 wickets in seven games. Only five other bowlers are in double-figures.

The pacy Hardus Viljoen added some heat to the sauce and took one for 25 in his four overs, but it was Ferreira who arguably did the most damage to the high-flying Paarl Royals batting line-up, bringing down Hain (2), Rubin Hermann (28) and Dayyaan Galiem (9) as he finished with a career-best three for 23.

Even though Root and David Miller, whose wife gave birth in the morning, were missing from the Royals team, veteran Indian star Dinesh Karthik was still way down at number six in the batting order. He formed a workmanlike partnership of 58 for the seventh wicket with Fortuin, striking back at the dominant Joburg attack with three late sixes.

Karthik’s 53 off 39 balls at least gave the visitors a total they could try to defend.

But first they had to get past Du Plessis, which proved near impossible, such was the domineering mood of the former Proteas captain. He provided most of the momentum in a first-wicket stand of 54 in seven overs with Devon Conway (20) and then added another 76 for the second wicket off 50 deliveries with Leus du Plooy, who was back for his first game in a week and will be pleased with his unbeaten 18 off 16 balls.

Kwena Maphaka was the pick of the Paarl bowlers, conceding just 18 runs in his three overs, but the 18-year-old was given some lessons in the mental battle at the top level as Du Plessis had much to say to him. Faf is old enough to be his dad, but it did not seem like fatherly advice that was being dispensed out in the middle.

South African batting star Heinrich Klaasen hopes the impact sub rule used in the Indian Premier League never makes its way into international cricket, saying it negates the need for “smart batting”.

Klaasen steered the Proteas to victory in their opening T20 World Cup match in New York, a meagre target of 78 still requiring the batsmen to be at their sharpest on a treacherous pitch that saw the facilities at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium being criticised for producing a game that lacked entertainment value as the International Cricket Council seeks to reach new markets.

It was all a far cry from the recent IPL, in which strike-rates and totals reached all-time highs. Klaasen, the key finisher for Sunrisers Hyderabad in the IPL, had to play clever cricket against Sri Lanka on a pitch with inconsistent but often steep bounce, and plenty of seam movement, finishing with 19 not out off 22 balls.

It was the sort of match that would have been near-impossible in the IPL with the impact sub rule allowing teams to bolster their batting line-up while not weakening their bowling attack. Klaasen told SportsBoom that he would not like to see the international game adopt the gimmick.

“The impact sub rule allowed batsmen to play with much more freedom and the execution was at a different level on pitches that were good. In the IPL, you are measured by the number of sixes you hit and your strike-rate, that’s your bread-and-butter and no-one worries about your average,” Klaasen said.

“But I hope the impact sub does not come into international cricket. It frees up the batting side too much and you can have a batsman at number nine with it, so there’s no need for anyone to hang around.

“It takes away the creativity of batting, it takes away smart batting. Like when Jos Buttler scored a superb century off 60 balls for Rajasthan Royals against Kolkata Knight Riders to chase down 224, having scored just 25 off his first 18 deliveries. The impact sub will take away that sort of brilliance to sum up conditions and hang around a bit, against just bombing the ball over small boundaries.

“It will allow teams to not play the situation so well. We also don’t get a lot of difficult pitches in the IPL, which is why the way teams go extremely hard in the powerplay is the big trend, and then the middle-order adjusts depending on whether you’re in trouble or flying,” Klaasen said.

While South Africa started their T20 World Cup campaign in impressive fashion against Sri Lanka, Lady Luck has not always been on their side in ICC events and they are yet to win one of the main trophies. Klaasen says the number of players they have with experience in the high-pressure IPL arena has helped them perform better in recent World Cups.

“We’ve got off to a very good start which means we can relax a bit and just keep building on that confidence. We need to focus on what we do best and keep that intensity.

“But the Netherlands have beaten us twice and Bangladesh can beat any team on their day, so we need to play the big moments well in those games.

“We’ve matured and gelled nicely as a team and a lot of the guys have played in the IPL, where there is a lot of pressure and expectation. We have been playing good World Cup cricket lately. Of the last three World Cups, we’ve only had one bad one, the 2022 T20 in Australia when we didn’t play well.

“But in Abu Dhabi in the 2021 T20 we only lost one out of five matches but missed out on the semi-finals on nett run-rate, and last year in India in the ODI World Cup, we played some unbelievable cricket to reach the semi-finals,” Klaasen said.