Ken Borland

Heinrich Klaasen continued to display the form of old that first made him a Protea back in 2018 as he led the Northerns Titans to a comfortable 33-run win over the North-West Dragons in their CSA T20 Challenge match at St George’s Park on Tuesday.

Having been sent in to bat, Northerns were given a fine start by Quinton de Kock (34 off 17) and Theunis de Bruyn (25 off 19), but they still needed a good finish as they slipped to 78/4 inside the 10^th over.

Klaasen responded with a hard-hit 54 not out off 41 balls, his second half-century of the tournament, taking him to the fourth-most runs [226] at an average of 75.33.

With Donovan Ferreira scoring 37 not out off 35 balls, Northerns posted a highly-competitive 167/4.

Left-arm spinner Senuran Muthusamy was outstanding with the ball for North-West with 2/14 in his four overs, while Dwaine Pretorius took 1/26.

Veteran left-arm spinner Aaron Phangiso then bowled the Titans to victory as his 2/13 in four overs played the major role in North-West limping to 134/7.

All the Northerns bowlers were tight, though, with Aya Gqamane and Dewald Brevis also both picking up a brace of wickets.

In the afternoon game, the Boland Rocks were left hiding their heads in shame as they failed to chase down a target of 165 against the Free State Knights, despite only losing two wickets.

Free State won a thriller by three runs thanks to an outstanding final over of yorkers by Alfred Mothoa (4-0-33-0), who had 11 runs to defend.

Boland always looked in control with Janneman Malan scoring 33 off 25, Pieter Malan batting through for 60* off 51, Clyde Fortuin dashing to 46 off 31 and Christiaan Jonker adding 17* off 13, but in the end it was an ill-judged chase.

Spinner Gregory Mahlokoana (4-0-24-1) and Nealan van Heerden (4-0-30-0) also bowled tightly to leave the Rocks with too big of a mountain to climb in the end.

Free State posted 164/6 thanks to a solid batting display led by Chris Klijnhans (52 off 47) and Raynard van Tonder (38 off 33), while seamer Ziyaad Abrahams took 5/34, the best figures in the tournament so far.

Western Province will top the log if they beat the KZN Dolphins, who are also still in contention to join Northerns and Boland in the semi-finals, in Wednesday’s last day of round-robin matches. If KZN lose, then the winners of the Eastern Province Warriors versus North-West game will be the final qualifiers.

The Northerns Titans continued their assault for top spot on the CSA T20 Challenge log when they chased down a target of 149 against the Central Gauteng Lions with ease, winning by seven wickets with 11 balls to spare at St George’s Park on Thursday.

Quinton de Kock set about the bowling from the outset, racing to 22 off 11 balls, before Bjorn Fortuin (4-0-23-1) had him caught.

The chase was then brilliantly managed by captain Theunis de Bruyn, who stroked a fluent 63 not out off 51 balls, and Heinrich Klaasen, who sped to 44 off 33 deliveries as they broke the back of the chase with a third-wicket stand of 106 off just 71 balls.

Malusi Siboto took 2/21 in 3.1 overs as he and Fortuin were the only Lions bowlers not to fetch.

Having elected to bat first, the Lions made a fine start with Reeza Hendricks (41 off 37) and Kagiso Rapulana (31 off 25) added 58 for the first wicket in 8.3 overs.

Tabraiz Shamsi (4-0-25-2) then set in motion a collapse with the wickets of Hendricks and the dangerous Shane Dadswell (0) with successive deliveries, as the Lions slumped to 101/6 in the 16^th over.

Sisanda Magala gave them some hope, however, as he blasted a quickfire 33 not out off just 18 deliveries.

Shamsi was backed up by excellent spin bowling by Aaron Phangiso (4-0-18-1) and Dewald Brevis (3-0-18-1).

Northerns are now just one point behind the log-leading Western Province side.

In the afternoon game, another sensational innings by Tristan Stubbs took Eastern Province to 156/6 after they elected to bat first, but the Warriors would pay for poor fielding and untidy bowling as the Boland Rocks passed that score with three wickets and two balls to spare.

Stubbs continued to push for higher honours as he belted 47 off 30 balls, with Wihan Lubbe (35 off 25) and Diego Rosier (31 off 22) providing valuable help.

Boland’s spinners, led by leggie Shaun von Berg (4-0-26-3), were outstanding – Imran Manack taking 1/21 and Siyabonga Mahima conceding just 22 runs in their quota of overs.

The Warriors dismissed both Malan brothers in the first two overs, but Boland were then let off the hook as catches were dropped, allowing Clyde Fortuin and Ferisco Adams, who both scored 27 off 17 balls, to provide some impetus.

Young Michael Copeland played an impressively mature innings of 40 and Christiaan Jonker hit 30 off 25, before Hardus Viljoen saw the Rocks home with 18 not out off 8 balls.

Jon-Jon Smuts (4-0-16-1) led a good bowling display by the spinners, with Tsepo Ndwandwa taking 2/33 and Lizo Makhosi 1/16 in three overs.

Notwithstanding the continued frustrations of Covid, there is very good reason for New Zealand to host both their forthcoming Test matches against South Africa at the Hagley Oval in Christchurch: The ground is a fortress for the Black Caps.

The Proteas were originally scheduled to play the second Test at the Basin Reserve in Wellington, but because the series will be played in a bio-bubble – New Zealand are currently battling the spread of Omicron – both matches are now in Christchurch, the largest city on the South Island.

And since the Hagley Oval became the venue of choice for international matches in Canterbury in 2014, New Zealand have lost just one of their 10 Tests there – against Australia in 2016. They have been in rampant form in their last four games there – beating Bangladesh and Pakistan by an innings, India by seven wickets and Sri Lanka by 423 runs.

Speaking of rampant, opening batsman Tom Latham has scored 864 runs at an average of 57.60 in nine Tests at Hagley Oval, while ferocious 6’8 fast bowler Kyle Jamieson has taken 22 wickets at 13.36 in three Tests there. Which suggests pace and bounce will come into play.

South Africa have only played two Tests in Christchurch, both of them at the old Lancaster Park rather than Hagley Oval. They won by an innings in 1932 in the inaugural Test between the two countries and then drew in 1999 when Herschelle Gibbs cruised to 211 not out and Jacques Kallis stroked 148*.

The success of Jamieson, Tim Southee and Trent Boult (both of whom average 21 at the ground) at Hagley Oval suggests the Proteas pacemen will be as happy as the songbirds in the adjacent botanical gardens.

But there has also been heavy run-scoring at Hagley Oval, with both Latham and Kane Williamson scoring big double-hundreds in 2022 and 2021 respectively, and there have been six other scores of more than 150 since 2014.

So that will please a South African batting line-up that might be getting a bit frustrated with the extremely sporty pitches they have had to play on at home in recent years.

The Proteas leave for New Zealand on Wednesday evening and the first Test starts on February 17.

Not even the downpours that washed out the entire second day’s play of the first Test between the Proteas and India in Centurion on Monday could put out the fires Cricket South Africa’s selection convenor was fighting as critics continued to lambast the inclusion of Marco Jansen ahead of Duanne Olivier as adulterating the home attack.

But Victor Mpitsang, the convenor of the selection panel, did confirm The Citizen’s report on the first day of the Test that Olivier had been left out due to his bowling workloads not being sufficient to last a five-day match due to a bout of Covid he suffered at the start of the month.

The 21-year-old Jansen was therefore brought into the team for his debut and struggled, along with the rest of the Proteas attack. India, having won the toss and elected to bat, amassed 272/3 led by Lokesh Rahul’s unbeaten 122. The left-arm quick’s first day of international cricket could have been very different though if wicketkeeper Quinton de Kock had taken a sharp catch off Mayank Agarwal in Jansen’s fifth over.

Jansen ended the first day with 0/61 in 17 overs. Lungi Ngidi, another man whose fitness was in question given how little competitive cricket he has played in the last few months, was the only wicket-taker for South Africa with 3/45 in 17 overs.

“Duanne Olivier is healthy and well, but did return a positive Covid-19 test result a number of weeks ago, which forced him to quarantine and took time away from his training ahead of the current Test series against India,” Mpitsang was reported as saying on the second day of the Test.

“His workloads were not where the selection panel would have wanted them to be by the time he entered the team bubble ahead of the first Test.

“He also picked up a hamstring niggle during the two-day inter-squad match at the start of the camp, and the selectors did not want to risk him unnecessarily when there are two more Test matches to think about,” Mpitsang said.

“Marco Jansen was the standout performer with the ball against India A in their recent tour to South Africa and the selectors backed him to take on the senior India team and do well,” Mpitsang added.

“Every player who has been selected for this Proteas team is believed to be capable of representing the national team and giving a performance of the highest level. The absence of one player does not take away from the quality that another brings to the set-up.”

Unfortunately for CSA, the fact that the explanation only came out on the second day of the Test has seen the press exercise their autonomy to react negatively to being kept in the dark.

Conspiracy theories also abounded on social media.

The good news is that Olivier is expected to be fully fit for the second Test at the Wanderers starting on January 3.

Glenton Stuurman is reportedly also carrying a leg niggle.