Ken Borland

The Proteas were meant to make their return from the Covid-19 Lockdown with a tour to the West Indies in the southern hemisphere winter, but it seems it will be England touring South Africa that will provide them with their first taste of international action.

England are keen to play three ODIs and three T20 internationals from mid-November to early December, with domestic action kicking off in South Africa on November 2. While British media have speculated that the series will take place in a bio-bubble in Cape Town, it is known that Highveld venues have also been told to prepare to host the 50-over world champions.

The series against one of the Big Three provides an opportunity too good to waste for CSA to start generating some much-needed income after all cricket came to a standstill in March.

Despite this week’s series loss to Australia, England remain a powerhouse white-ball outfit and their tour could be one of the highlights of the summer, particularly since Sri Lanka will be the Test opposition over the traditional festive season schedule.

Then again, the Proteas have a score to settle with Sri Lanka, who became the first sub-continent team to win a series in South Africa with their shock 2-0 triumph in 2018/19.

South Africa’s cricketers will have four-day cricket in November and December in which to get up to full power, with the Momentum One-Day Cup scheduled for early next year. While the Mzansi Super League has reportedly been scrapped for this season due to the constraints of Lockdown, it is possible that a franchise T20 competition will be played to end the summer.

Herschelle Gibbs was South Africa’s leading run-scorer as they dominated the group stages of the 1999 World Cup, only to fall agonizingly short in their notorious tied semi-final against Australia, but he believes all-rounders were the key to their success in England that year and that is an area that has the potential to be a problem for the Proteas as the tournament returns there next year.

South Africa had Lance Klusener, named the player of the tournament, backed by Jacques Kallis and Shaun Pollock, in 1999 and the current Proteas obviously don’t have all-rounders of that proven quality and experience at the moment.

“In 1999 we had three all-rounders and that led us to probably our best chance of winning the World Cup. A strong one-day team always has good all-rounders, but I think at the moment, all-rounders are our biggest headache. The depth is not quite there; we have Chris Morris in and out the side and Andile Phehlukwayo and Wiaan Mulder blow a bit hot and cold for me.

“So that’s going to be a big question mark for the selectors. Conditions in England could suit a guy like Vernon Philander perfectly. He can bat, but there are question marks over how effective he is in limited-overs cricket. Otherwise the bowlers are pretty sorted and it’s nice to see Dale Steyn firing again, bowling in the late 140s and looking great,” Gibbs told Saturday Citizen at the Sanlam Cancer Challenge, where he was playing golf as one of the celebrity delegates.

Like politicians trying to impress the voters, those players who are not assured of their places in the World Cup squad will be mounting one last desperate push to impress the selectors in the next couple of months. Gibbs believes there are still enough matches before the World Cup to sort out any deficiencies in the team.

“There are enough ODIs before the World Cup and there’s still a chance for some new faces. We’re probably also still lacking a bit in specialist batting depth. Dean Elgar was given a chance, but the selectors have probably decided that he’s not a one-day player. So there’s more pressure on Hashim Amla and Quinton de Kock, especially with AB de Villiers having retired, and Quinny is going to have to bear the brunt of the run-scoring I think.

“Our variety in the attack is also a bit short – Ngidi, Steyn, Rabada and Phehlukwayo are all right-armers, and then there’s Tabraiz Shamsi or Imran Tahir and JP Duminy to bowl a bit. So we might lack a bit of variety, but we might get away with it if the overhead conditions help us. But the all-rounders and the top-order are the two main question marks for me,” Gibbs said.

https://www.pressreader.com/south-africa/the-citizen-gauteng/20181013/282428465149110

Quinton de Kock has not batted with such assurance of his role or such clinical efficiency in Test cricket before and his career-best innings took South Africa to 421 for eight at lunch on the second day of the fourth Test against England at SuperSport Park in Centurion on Saturday.

South Africa had resumed their first innings on 329 for five and De Kock’s fine 85 not out off just 94 balls, with 12 fours and a six spread all around the ground, made sure that the memorable centuries scored by Stephen Cook and Hashim Amla on the first day were translated into a sizeable total.

De Kock lost overnight partner Temba Bavuma (35) before long on the second morning, the diminutive batsman not driving with the same authority as he did on the first evening and edging Stuart Broad behind after he had added just three runs to his overnight score.

Kagiso Rabada then fell to his first ball, Jimmy Anderson finding his pads with a brilliant inswinging yorker for his first wicket in 24 overs of toil. The batsman’s review was in vain as Rabada recorded his second duck in his fledgling Test career.

With South Africa having slipped to 336 for seven, De Kock began playing his shots in impressive fashion, wowing a capacity Saturday crowd.

Kyle Abbott was his partner in a rollicking eighth-wicket stand of 50 off 55 balls, having his career-best score of 16 to boast about.

Once Abbott was removed midway through the session, trapped lbw by Ben Stokes, De Kock linked up again, this time with Dane Piedt (10*) as they carried South Africa through to lunch with an unbeaten stand of 35 for the ninth wicket.

England were let down by their catching behind the wicket on the second morning, with Stokes dropping a sharp chance in the gully from De Kock off Anderson in the third over when the left-hander had just 28, and wicketkeeper Jonathan Bairstow and slip Alastair Cook allowing another edge from De Kock to sail between them in Chris Woakes’ penultimate over before lunch.

https://citizen.co.za/sport/south-african-sport/sa-cricket-sport/957580/957580/

The Springboks’ game against England at Twickenham on Saturday is something to look forward to, but it will be played in very different conditions to the World Cup in Japan in September.

Next year’s showpiece tournament will be played on super-fast, hard fields and the weather will be hot. In England at this time of year, the fields are very different and it’s cold, with the Springboks coming from temperatures of 30 degrees to just six or seven degrees.

There has been some consistency in coach Rassie Erasmus’s selection: There has to be 10 Tests into his tenure, that’s what you would expect. There are a few youngsters he is going to have a look at but there are also one or two surprises in his squad.

The selection of Schalk Brits as the third hooker is intriguing. He is a 37-year-old who has started just one of his 11 Tests. It’s ironic that Schalk is mentoring Malcolm Marx who has more Test caps than he has. Some people have drawn parallels to when Heyneke Meyer recalled Victor Matfield, but the lock had played 110 Tests when he was recalled in June 2014, and he had played a full season of SuperRugby.

Gio Aplon has also been recalled at the age of 36 and also from semi-retirement, playing in Japan’s top league, which is a mix of corporate workers and professional rugby players. Gio obviously has talent and good feet, but he’s going to find Test rugby a whole different pace and the intensity of the collisions will be far greater, everything will just happen much quicker.

Amongst the other players brought in, JD Schickerling is probably the next lock in, while Lood de Jager is fresh and a proven international performer. With the injuries to Lukhanyo Am and Lionel Mapoe, Ruhan Nel is also next in line for the number 13 jersey and the Springboks management called him into the squad earlier this year as well.

I am surprised none of the Du Preez brothers were chosen.

Jean-Luc is so physical and has such a big impact on the gain-line, while Daniel was selected earlier this year. Robert has now won successive Currie Cups with different teams and has proven game-management ability. The fact that Damian Willemse was not picked at flyhalf by Western Province for such a big game as the Currie Cup final tells you something about his game-management. But at least Robert gets to go to Sale now and it will be good for him to play with Faf de Klerk.

The Springboks’ contracted and Japan-based players should be fresh. They will all be ready to go, and it is a shame that the England game is outside the international window, so South Africa won’t be able to field their strongest side.

These Autumn internationals are going to sort England out after their six-match losing run earlier this year. They play the Springboks, Australia and New Zealand in the next few weeks and then we will really be able to see where they are heading into World Cup year.

The big thing for the Springboks is that they won’t have the safety net of playing on the Highveld, and John Mitchell, England’s new defence coach, knows the South African players well and would have been part of the coaching structures while he was with the Bulls. He and Jacques Nienaber would have had meetings about the blueprints for defence and the breakdown. He will intimately know the Bok defensive system.

Mitchell will implement a very high press and rush line-speed in the English defence; it’s a very high-risk system and the Bulls struggled to master it. Their defensive record was 14^th in SuperRugby, after having a full Currie Cup as well to implement the system.

It’s ironic that Mitchell ended the SuperRugby campaign saying he was looking for a specialist defence coach because of this defensive record, and now he’s the defence coach of a top-four international team.

England gave the Springboks real problems out wide in June, because the South Africans were far too tight in defence. But what cost the English at the end of the day was staying on the coast, they were in that death zone in the last 10 minutes of the first half and the last 20 of the second half in the first two Tests in Johannesburg and Bloemfontein. Duane Vermeulen was very destructive at the breakdown at the back end of both halves because England couldn’t get their cleaners to the breakdown.

England coped very well in the wet at Cape Town in terms of fielding the Springbok high-ball, box-kick strategy, using Mike Brown as the principal catcher, who has now been dropped. It shows that four months is a very short time in international rugby.

I believe the Springboks will again launch, then pass to a second runner forward, and then choose to kick left or right and put the ball behind England, which makes it very difficult for the fullback to defend. It’s a conservative strategy but it puts pressure on the opposition and the tactic had success against New Zealand in the two games this year.

The Springboks will want to play two phases and then kick behind, this is a really good tactic against a high line and a press defence because there is always space at the back because the wings are up. It will be a test though for the two young scrumhalves on tour, can they execute this strategy?

Plus there’s no Willie le Roux for this weekend, which is maybe why Aplon is there, in fact that is the most probable explanation for his selection. Rassie will want to turn England and make them exit, bringing into play the massive Springbok lineout which will have four excellent jumpers. So he needs a right and left-footed combination at flyhalf and fullback and height to compete on the England lineout.

The key for the Springboks will be the box-kick, because they maul so much, and Erasmus learnt during his time with Munster how important a kicking game from scrumhalf is, and De Klerk has done really well this year in that regard. England will be preparing for a barrage of box-kicks after the maul.

The Northern Hemisphere tour is always exciting for the players because they get to play in those places up north only once a year. They also don’t train much because there’s no way you can improve their fitness at this late stage of the year, and the preparation is just about getting the organisation and strategy right, and making sure they are mentally fresh for Saturday.

John McFarland is the assistant coach at Stade Francais, having been the Springbok defence coach from 2012 through to the 2015 World Cup, where they conceded the least line-breaks in the tournament and an average of just one try per game. From 2001 to 2012 he won three SuperRugby titles (2007, 09, 10) with the Bulls and five Currie Cup crowns with the Blue Bulls. McFarland enjoyed three years with the Kubota Spears in Tokyo from 2016-18.