Ken Borland

Sunday’s Betway Pink Day ODI between the Proteas and the Netherlands at the DP World Wanderers Stadium will be played on the same pitch that was used for the high-scoring final T20 between South Africa and the West Indies, and building a suitable strategy for the short boundary on the scoreboard side will be a key factor in the game.

The boundary on the eastern side of the Wanderers will be just 57 metres away from the pitch and, if targeting the short side was not a priority already, Enza Construction have added their own incentive for the two teams, while also demonstrating their passion for serving the communities they help develop.

Enza Construction have placed a billboard to the left of the scoreboard and the first batsman to hit this on the full will earn himself R250 000 with the company donating another R250 000 in celebration to the Pink Day charities that support breast cancer awareness, education, early detection, treatment and research. If no-one manages to hit a six into the target, then Enza Construction will still make a R100 000 donation to the Pink Day cause.

“Being a proud contributor to our community is a core value at Enza Construction and we are passionate about the health and wellbeing of the people within those communities. We want to give our support to those people who are working tirelessly to overcome breast cancer.

“To that end we fully support the Pink Day cause and want to do our bit to promote and boost their efforts to encourage routine screening for early detection for what is now the most common cancer diagnosed globally,” Clinton Crowie, the executive director of Enza Construction, said.

The Proteas were not able to come up with the goods in the third and final T20 against the West Indies, but they will be banking on better execution of what they believe is a suitable plan for the short boundary.

“That short side really is quite small and logic tells you to try and stay away from there if you’re the bowler. It’s a test of our skills and it comes down to execution,” Aiden Markram, captain in the T20 series, said.

“You try and play the percentages, but a team like the West Indies were mishitting sixes on the long side! When bowling, you just try and bowl really wide outside off-stump, and you also have to use slower-ball bouncers and balls at the batsmen’s heels. We’re happy with our plans,” Markram said.

While Enza are leaders in construction, the Proteas have a master of destruction in their team in opener Quinton de Kock. The left-hander will certainly be targeting the short boundary and the Enza billboard when he is batting at the Corlett Drive End at the Wanderers on Sunday.

The former Proteas captain, as ever, simplified his approach when it comes to unusual field dimensions.

“Certain situations demand different ways of going about things, but as a batter, you’re just trying to target that boundary in any way possible. As a bowler, you’re just trying your best not to get hit there,” De Kock said.

“But on the Highveld, as we saw at Centurion in the T20s against the West Indies, a short boundary is not always relevant because the ball travels so far up here.”

The more sixes there are the better, of course, as various sponsors are lining up to add their bit to the sponsorship of the fight against breast cancer.

South African rugby fans can rest easy that the four Rainbow Cup franchises won’t merely be going through the motions in yet another tournament of local derbies when the new competition kicks off on Saturday, with the massive incentive of a place in the European Champions Cup possibly being up for grabs.

Talks are apparently underway for the winners of Rainbow Cup SA to be given a spot in the 2021/22 European Rugby Heineken Champions Cup. That prestigious and lucrative tournament has prizemoney of about one million euro for the champions – the equivalent of nearly R17.5 million, which would be a huge boost for any of South Africa’s franchises given the constrained economic outlook for rugby in this country.

The Champions Cup brings together the 20 top teams from the three major European leagues – the English Premiership, France’s Top 14 and the Celtic Pro14, in which the four South African franchises are scheduled to appear later this year.

Conquering Europe may be as ambitious a plan as some of astronautics’ efforts to land on Mars but the rewards are great and will be worth the immense planning and effort. One of the things that will be required is larger squads and talks are already underway with SA Rugby for them to increase the 45-player limit for franchise squads.

Bulls coach Jake White is certainly in favour of further expansion into Europe.

“Hopefully something will be formalised because we want to take part in the Heineken Cup. There are massive incentives to play in that tournament and I remember when I coached Montpellier, the French clubs put a lot of pressure on you to qualify for that event. The importance was shown when Leinster played Munster in the Rainbow Cup last weekend and rested 13 players because they have a Champions Cup semi-final this weekend,” White said on Friday.

“Leinster have used 57 players this season in all competitions and so we’ll try and find out from SA Rugby if we can have bigger squads and more money because it’s important we get the same resources as those European clubs. If we lose players to the Springboks and get a couple of injuries, will we be strong enough to compete at three levels – Currie Cup, Pro14 and Europe?”