Ken Borland

The energy levels of our DP World Lions men’s team are obviously high and they have had the benefit of a full week’s preparation ahead of their first outing in the defence of their CSA 4-Day Series title as they host the Momentum Multiply Titans from Tuesday.

Our Pride’s last outing saw them clinch the CSA T20 Challenge title in the most emphatic of fashion, hammeriing the self-same Titans in the final, having beaten their Gauteng derby rivals earlier in the week in Qualifier 1.

The Titans will now return to the DP World Wanderers Stadium bullring and Russell Domingo, #ThePrideOfJozi head coach, has warned that their neighbours will be hurting and keen for revenge.

But most of the DP World Lions squad named for the four-day opener played a major role in last season’s triumph, as well as being key members of the squad that won the CSA T20 Challenge last month, so there is plenty of confidence in our Pride’s camp.

“We played a warm-up game and we’ve had net sessions in the last week, so it has been good prep. There’s a good vibe in the squad and the energy levels are high. If you asked us what was the trophy we most want to win, it would be the red-ball one.

“It would have been a nightmare week if we had lost the final, but the Titans will bring a really good team and they will be hurting. There are never any easy games against them, but we are all up for the challenge,” Domingo said.

Connor Esterhuizen, who finished as the DP World Lions’ leading run-scorer in the triumphant T20 campaign, will again be wearing the wicketkeeper’s gloves with Wandile Makwetu still recovering from his broken finger.

The seasoned Josh Richards and the exciting young Mohammed Manack are set to open the batting, with the class of captain Dominic Hendricks and Zubayr Hamza to follow. Mitchell van Buuren will be the mainstay of the middle-order, while Delano Potgieter, the hero of last season’s four-day final, fills the all-rounder berth.

The exciting trio of Lutho Sipamla, whose demolition job on the Titans in the T20 final earned him a recall to the Proteas squad, Tshepo Moreki and Codi Yusuf will look after the pace bowling department, while Bjorn Fortuin and Junaid Dawood, the joint leading wicket-taker in the T20 competition, are the spin bowlers in the squad.

Khaya Fakude is the new face in the team, the DP World Lions Academy batsman having impressed the coaching staff with his ability and talent. The KES and University of Johannesburg representative hails from Kanyamazane near Nelspruit.

Sharks hooker Bongi Mbonambi said not allowing outside influences to affect the inside of the team, and pulling together to make sure there were consistent energy levels between the forwards and backs, were the main things they needed to improve on from their loss to the Stormers if they are to beat the Bulls in their United Rugby Championship match in Pretoria on Saturday.

But are there any other things the Sharks need to do to make sure they do the business against the Bulls?

1. They need to start much better.

Especially playing away from home, as they were last weekend and will be at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday, they cannot afford to allow the home team to settle and dictate the run of play. But the Sharks seemed somehow distracted and not fully focused on the task at hand against a fired-up Stormers side. The Sharks lacked energy and intensity in the opening exchanges, which perhaps contributed to several handling errors. It meant they struggled to gain any momentum.

2. They need secure, more consistent set-pieces.

Solid set-piece displays were a feature of the Sharks’ impressive win in Johannesburg a fortnight ago and their scrummaging was outstanding against the Stormers in Durban, although they still allowed their opponents to sneak the draw. But in Cape Town, they gave away crucial scrum penalties and were untidy at key moments in the lineouts. Their woes in Pretoria recently have started up front and they cannot afford to give the Bulls an advantage in the set-pieces.

3. They need to fix their breakdown work.

You can tell the opposition have enjoyed a field day at the rucks when their openside flank gets man of the match as Deon Fourie did in Cape Town. The Sharks conceded turnovers and penalties at the breakdown at vital moments, which needs to be rectified. Their lack of organisation and/or accuracy at the breakdown is also having a telling effect on their attacking efforts because they are not securing enough quick ball.

4. They need to sort out their personnel at flyhalf and inside centre.

Although he is a quality player, moving Lukhanyo Am to inside centre seems to have adulterated their backline, with his defensive organisation sorely missed at outside centre. Bringing Marius Louw back into the No.12 jersey would allow Am to have his usual impact at No.13, but flyhalf is also a troubling position for the Sharks. What Tito Bonilla brought on attack was undone by his defensive lapses.

Eastern Cape Cricket on Thursday called on Cricket South Africa (CSA) to do “something tangible to put an end to racism at all levels of the sport”, perhaps unaware that the national body had already released a statement the previous night placing on record all the initiatives they have already implemented to ensure transformation of the cricket system.

CSA also reaffirmed their support for the Black Lives Matter movement and said it welcomed both Lungi Ngidi’s initial statement in this regard and the letter of support made by 36 Black coaches and former players.

CSA said they have spent nearly R385 million on cricket transformation and development in the 2019/20 financial year alone and will continue to invest resources in those programs. They pointed out that 10 of the 12-person CSA Board, including president Chris Nenzani and vice-president Beresford Williams, are Black, six of them being Black African. CSA has 64 full-time employees, 52 of which are Black.

In terms of coaching, 92% of nationally accredited coaches in South Africa are Black and 67% of national umpires and match referees.

According to the CSA statement, they support 612 township-based cricket clubs, 1052 township primary school cricket clubs and 572 township high school cricket clubs. They added, however, that the facilities in these areas remain a huge area of concern for the organisation.

Meanwhile, Rassie van der Dussen showed why he is not just a superb batsman but also a top-class human being as he became the first White current Protea to publicly back the Black Lives Matter movement.

“I support BLM, I’m against all murders, physical, character and cultural murder. I support equal opportunities for all. Because I support BLM it does not mean that I support violence or Marxism, therefore I refuse to be labelled by people,” Van der Dussen said in a tweet.

“The Boards of Eastern Province Cricket and the Eastern Cape Cricket Warriors franchise call on Cricket South Africa to take to heart the racism issues raised by former national players and coaches – many of whom are from the Eastern Cape. It is not enough to merely condemn incidents of racism and to publicly support the Black Lives Matter movement. Something tangible must be done to put an end to racism at all levels of the sport – and particularly at professional level where the example needs to be set,” the Eastern Cape Cricket statement said.

Andrew Breetzke, the CEO of the South African Cricketers’ Association, told Sport24 on Thursday that a re-evaluation of both their and CSA’s role in systemic racism needs to take place.

“SACA has life skills programmes that deal directly with diversity in teams and we need to revisit that. We have systems in place that have dealt with issues where players feel they have been unfairly treated in the past, and that still stands, but we need to look at them again. We are, and have always been, there to take up issues for players. In any given season, there are a number of issues that are raised. The system does work. 

“What has come to the fore in the last two weeks, though, is the unconscious biases that exist and that requires some work from everybody. We’re pleased that players are speaking up about things that have impacted their careers in the past. We have to welcome that. We have to have those discussions. That’s how we look at this and it’s incumbent on all stakeholders to look within,” Breetzke said.

A statement from the Proteas team regarding the Black Lives Matter movement was expected on Thursday but had still not been made at the time of going to press.

 

The KwaZulu-Natal North Coast is generally extremely degraded habitat due to the development of extensive sugarcane fields and timber plantations, as well as the high levels of urbanisation and the roads and alien plant infestations it brings.

The natural vegetation of the coastal belt is classified as Endangered; comprising Moist Coastal Forest, Thorn and Palmveld; bushed grassland and bushland thicket. But these days, as you venture north from Durban, it is just a sea of sugarcane, endless and monotonous.

The undulating topography of the area – rolling hills heading westwards to the plateau in the central regions of the province – with steep sloping ground, means only sugarcane can really be considered as a permanent crop, because the ground is either too wet or too sloping to grow much else.

The valley bottoms are where more indigenous flora is found and, having spotted a dam on the maps of the Maidstone area, I decided to head there to see what the birdlife would be like around this colonial village that was built for the employees of Tongaat Hulett Sugar Company.

But in order to find my way down to the dam, I had to negotiate a myriad of little tracks through the monoculture. Being towards the end of May, it was also the dry season and I wasn’t expecting much. But it was proven otherwise as the canefields threw up some birds of their own.

For good birding habitat, the drainage streams between canefields with irrigation water still in them proved a hit with the birds, including Whitewinged Widow, but it was still a surprise when a couple of Spurwinged Goose turned up where the water had collected into a small pool near the road.

You wouldn’t find Southern Africa’s largest duck (it’s not a real goose) in the actual sugarcane but it is generally common and conspicuous at inland waters and fallow fields, usually being seen in flight.

Two Southern Red Bishop males, surprisingly still in breeding plumage, went towering upwards in the sky nearby.

While the Stonechat was the most common bird, the Fantailed Widowbird is the common Euplectid of sugarcane fields, flying up out of the rows of green, alongside the Yellowthroated Longclaw, which is more a bird of the lower reaches of South Africa, as you head towards the sea, being far more widespread than the endemic Orangethroated (Cape) Longclaw, and flying up from the grass on the tracks that cut through the cane.

The only natural habitats available on-site are restricted to a few isolated patches of riparian vegetation along water courses, where I was able to confirm the winter presence of Redwinged Starling along with a family of Vervet Monkey, and the major feeder for Dudley Pringle Dam is the Wewe River, part of the Tongaat River catchment.

The dam itself is not very accessible but I did manage to find one spot to walk around, a launching area for a local canoe club.

Little flocks of Fantailed Widowbird, the males with their red shoulder patches, flew up out of the tall, moist grassland around the dam, over which Egyptian Geese were flying.

A Threebanded Plover, which has been recorded breeding in the area, was nodding along on the dilapidated weir, while a few pairs of African Jacana, an unlikely bird to see on sugarcane farms, were squabbling and flying around and then settling in the waterweed.

Another surprise was when a Whitebreasted Cormorant came gliding into view from around the corner of the dam, and I was delighted to see a few Little Bee-Eater hawking insects from the reeds on the dam shore.

There is more vegetation, including stands of bamboo, around the dwellings on the farm, and it was interesting to see a Fiscal Flycatcher in the same tree as the more fierce bird it mimics in appearance, the Fiscal Shrike.

A similar example of mimicry in which one birds looks confusingly similar to another highly aggressive bird occurs between the Southern Black Flycatcher and the Forktailed Drongo, with the Flycatcher hypothesised to gain some sort of advantage by looking like the more rapacious Drongo.

Coincidentally, a Southern Black Flycatcher was spotted in the tree right next door to a Forktailed Drongo.

Where is Dudley Pringle Dam?

Sightings list

Forktailed Drongo

Hadeda Ibis

Redwinged Starling

Southern Black Flycatcher

Cape Wagtail

Fiscal Shrike

Grassveld Pipit

Fiscal Flycatcher

Tawnyflanked Prinia

African Stonechat

Vervet Monkey

Southern Red Bishop

Spurwinged Goose

Redeyed Dove

Blackeyed Bulbul

Whitewinged Widow

Yellowthroated Longclaw

Fantailed Widowbird

Egyptian Goose

Threebanded Plover

African Jacana

Whitebreasted Cormorant

Little Swift

Litte Bee-Eater