Ken Borland

The Proteas have enjoyed a superb record-equalling run in T20 cricket of late and will go into next month’s T20 World Cup with their confidence at a high. While Sri Lanka were disappointingly hapless during the 3-0 series whitewash, perhaps more credit should be given to the South Africans for being so clinical in dispatching the home side.

Most critics would probably have backed Sri Lanka to win the series on their home pitches, which were typically sub-continental and designed to favour their strengths and expose the supposed Proteas weaknesses.

Playing in the subcontinent means dealing with spin and South Africa were brilliant in both the progress their batsmen have made on turning pitches and also the sheer quality of their own spin attack, which was relied upon to an extent never seen before in a Proteas team.

The T20 World Cup will be played in what is expected to be similar conditions in the United Arab Emirates.

“It was very pleasing to win the series in the manner we did. We trusted in our process: Sri Lanka have some world-class spinners but our batsmen found a way to handle them and our spinners showed what they can do when they are backed. It’s good that the hierarchy is backing spin more.

“I obviously have my game-plans before the match, but you need to adapt on the field and read the conditions as soon as possible. I try to identify periods when we can go for the kill, and I must give credit to my bowlers for the number of times they came on and took wickets, or even an economical couple of overs. We wanted to really make an impact after the bitter pill of losing the ODI series,” stand-in captain Keshav Maharaj said.

Quinton de Kock may no longer have alpha-male status as the captain, but the wicketkeeper/batsman continued to mark himself out as the Proteas’ key batsman, a real matchwinner in T2 cricket. He was the leading run-scorer in the series with 153 runs, being dismissed just once as he claimed the man of the series award and a career-high eighth place in the ICC T20 rankings.

“Quinny has been in great form after obviously having a tough time in Pakistan. He’s been fantastic in the team environment and you can’t keep a player like that down for too long. He’s obviously in a happy space after a bit of rest, the break was good for him and it rewarded us too.

“He’s going to be a really big player for us at the World Cup and it was good to see him carry his bat through a couple of times, when it would be easy to just score thirty and get out. He’s showing a lot of responsibility and he will be a big name for as at the World Cup,” coach Mark Boucher said.

Late lapses cost the Sharks victory against the Bulls and the Stormers, and also made their game against the Lions before that closer than it should have been, and that is a key area of improvement coach Sean Everitt is looking for when his team travel to Ellis Park on Saturday for their Rainbow Cup encounter with the Gautengers.

And even though the Sharks are resting several Springboks as per the agreement with SA Rugby, Everitt has been able to name a powerful bench that should be able to have a late impact against the Lions. Their first-choice front row is amongst the replacements, Ruben van Heerden and Thembelani Bholi are seasoned forwards now, centre Jeremy Ward is an exciting runner and scrumhalf Grant Williams’ ability to lift the pace is perhaps his greatest attribute.

“When we played the Lions here at Kings Park, we had a lapse in the last 10 minutes, but the game was basically won. Fez Mbatha, Ox Nche and Thomas du Toit can hopefully be a bit of a bomb squad for us in Joburg and we can finish stronger than we have in the last few weeks, so things have worked out nicely in that regard. We’ve had a good break and have been able to work on the aspects that have let us down,” Everitt said.

The impressive coaching methods of Everitt have seen him create a real family atmosphere within the Sharks squad and he has always focused on ensuring the levels of performance are right rather than results. Now that the Sharks are under pressure to deliver a result against the Lions to keep them contending for the Rainbow Cup final, nothing will change.

“There is pressure to perform in all areas, not just to win. In some games our scrum hasn’t functioned and then our scrum will be good but the lineout fails. Results come with performance, ensuring we get those processes right first; performance goes hand-in-hand with results. We are still in the race and we have played good rugby up there recently.

“The conditions suit the exciting brand of rugby we want to play and in the last 18 months we have got the mental aspect of playing on the Highveld right. We know that the Lions have improved a lot over the last four weeks though, since our last game against them, and I am expecting a tough tussle,” Everitt said.

The Sharks have won their last four matches at Ellis Park, dating back to their defeat in the opening game of Super Rugby in 2018.

Sharks coach Sean Everitt would have been apprehensive when his team went 7-28 down late in the first half against the Cheetahs in Bloemfontein on Wednesday night, but in the end the KwaZulu-Natalians fought back superbly and it took a 40-metre penalty by Frans Steyn in the 80^th minute to scrape a 39-38 win for the Free Staters.

The Sharks had actually played decent rugby in the first half, but mistakes and turnovers allowed the Cheetahs to show their attacking brilliance as they ran in four tries to lead 28-12 at the break.

But in the second half the Sharks showed their attacking abilities, giving the Cheetahs defence a torrid time. The Sharks replacement front row of Michael Kumbirai, Ntuthuko Mchunu and Fez Mbatha showed they can perform at this level as they earned scrum penalties that helped pile on the pressure on the home side in the second half, while Manie Libbok came on at flyhalf and showed he will be a fine back-up to Curwin Bosch when serious competition resumes.

His linking and passing game constantly had the defence guessing and it was his brilliant individual play in slipping through a gap, regathering his own grubber and then kicking ahead again before passing to substitute flank Celimpilo Gumede for the try that gave the Sharks the lead with 13 minutes remaining.

The Cheetahs certainly played their part in a match that featured 11 tries and seemed to be played at a billion miles an hour at times, but eventually ensured they secured the win rather than risking whatever rewards would come from a more expansive approach.

Steyn was a pillar of strength at inside centre and once again showed why he is considered rugby royalty and he was bang on the money with the final kick at goal after a high tackle by the Sharks.

Mark Boucher, the heartbeat of the South African team from the late 1990s to 2012, is hoping the experience and wisdom gained from all those years of playing and inspiring the changeroom will rub off on the new career of coach that he has chosen for himself, with the 39-year-old set to land the job as the new Titans mentor.

Boucher’s stellar career, in which he played 147 Tests and 295 ODIs and took the most dismissals in Test history, was ended on the 2012 tour of England when he suffered a serious eye injury after being hit by a bail in a warm-up game.

Since then Boucher has become a leading figure in rhino conservation and is with the Proteas squad in Durban at the moment, working as a consultant for the Test series against New Zealand. The Titans coaching job is the best-paid franchise post in the country and the Centurion-based team won two of the three domestic trophies on offer last season, so the famously nuggety cricketer has landed a high-profile role at the start of his coaching career.

‘I always said I would take five or six years off from the game and it’s been five years now so I’m ready to get involved again. I’m not sure where it’s going to take me, but I’ve always enjoyed imparting knowledge,” Boucher said this week when asked about his invitation to join the Proteas coaching staff.

“I’ve been through quite a few coaches and teams and cultures in my career, and also eras, I was part of the old Proteas team as well as the new. So the lessons I’ve learnt I’d be stupid not to use. I don’t really like the term ‘coach’, I’d like to be more of a man-manager. The game has changed and you see specialist coaches come in more these days,” Boucher said.

Although Boucher’s tenacity and competitiveness were his most famous attributes, he said he was also a student of the technical side of the game and would certainly bring that into his coaching.

“Even though people think of me more on the mental side, you pick up a few things behind the stumps, it provides a very good view. But I always used to sit behind the computer a lot too and look at opposing batsmen, I got a lot of knowledge that way, looking at head and hip positions because you’re trying to get these batsmen out.

“Being brought up in Border, where we didn’t have the best sides, you just had to make it work. Not every player in a team is going to have the technique of a Kallis or De Villiers, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a good player. You have to make do with what you’ve got, you can be technically sound but be lacking mentally, while someone like Graeme Smith didn’t have the greatest technique, but he had a very strong head,” Boucher pointed out.

Titans CEO Jacques Faul was unable to confirm Boucher’s appointment.

“The process has been completed and we have appointed a candidate that we feel can take the team forward and we will announce his name on Monday. Unfortunately we cannot speculate before that,” Faul said.