Ken Borland

October has not been a great month for Proteas captain Temba Bavuma as he has scored just 11 runs in three innings and has been battling with illness. But he has to now lead by example and not only score brisk runs up front but also steer his team through a massive last week of the month in which they play Zimbabwe on Monday, followed by Bangladesh (Thursday) and India (Sunday).

Bavuma has been knocked over in the first powerplay in five of his seven T20 Internationals this year, so there will be plenty on his mind as he opens the batting in what could well be seamer-friendly conditions in Hobart on Monday. He admitted that there are a few “conversations in his head”, but one thing we do know about Bavuma is that he is a tremendously tenacious character and he will be fighting hard at the Bellerive Oval.

“I feel good, I’ve gotten over that sickness in India and I’ve had a couple of net sessions,” Bavuma said on Sunday. “The pressure is not unique to me, all international players have to deal with it.

“Yes, as captain, it is a lot more blown up, all eyes are on you and there’s a lot more critique of your performance and how you lead. It comes with the responsibility, and I won’t shy away from it.

“I will face up to it as honourably and with as much gratitude as I can. I’m aware of the conversations in my head regarding my game and how I’m going to lead.

“But I’m not aware of any outside conversations, those are not discussed within the team. Our focus is on knowing what we want to do and how to do it, anything else is for other ears.” The only selection issues then, with the dominating Reeza Hendricks out in the cold, will be whether South Africa play two spinners or one, and whether their all-rounder will be Wayne Parnell or Marco Jansen.

The Proteas, ranked fourth in T20s to Zimbabwe’s 11^th and Bangladesh’s ninth, will go into their first two World Cup matches as favourites. They learned from last year’s event, in which they lost just one match but were edged out of the semi-finals on nett run-rate, that once they get the upperhand, there can be no hesitation in ruthlessly going for the jugular.

“Our biggest takeway from the previous World Cup was that every game matters, you have to perform as well as you can in every match, and make sure you keep the pulse of the run-rate,” Bavuma admitted.

“If you have the opportunity to win really well then you have to make sure you take it. We’ll be looking to execute as well as we can against Zimbabwe. There’s no time to ease into the tournament, it is so important to start well.

“It’s going to be challenging up front against the new ball, with the bowlers targeting off-stump. We have to be circumspect but obviously with the right intensity to put pressure on the bowlers,” Bavuma said.

It’s been many years since Australia experienced such volumes of rainfall as they are at the moment and the Proteas fell victim to the inclement weather on Wednesday when their second and final warm-up match for the T20 World Cup, against Bangladesh in Brisbane, was abandoned without a ball being bowled.

South Africa will open their World Cup campaign on Monday in Hobart against the top qualifier from Group B, in which Scotland, Zimbabwe, West Indies and Ireland are all locked on two points.

The abandonment of the Bangladesh game happened without there being a toss, so we don’t know whether appointed captain Temba Bavuma was going to play or not. But his form in a year so badly disrupted by injury and illness has been the biggest talking point in South African cricket of late, and there is no doubt he would have loved to have gathered some much-needed runs under his belt.

For the rest of the Proteas team, the weather was a mild irritation and Rilee Rossouw, such a well-travelled T20 player these days, said they are ready for when their curtain comes up on Monday.

“Some guys might be frustrated that we couldn’t play today, but for the others, we’re pretty much ready to go,” Rossouw said. “It’s something we couldn’t control and it’s unfortunate that we did not play today.

“But the guys put in a good shift in the indoor nets and the team is very confident, we have played a lot of cricket over the last month, we’ve had a lot of game-time.

“The boys are ready, playing good cricket and excited for that first match,” Rossouw said.

While Bavuma’s woes would almost certainly see him left out of Monday’s starting XI if he were not the captain, at least the Proteas know they have a ready-made, in-form replacement in Reeza Hendricks. Either him or Rossouw could comfortably open the batting with Quinton de Kock.

In the absence of both Bavuma and De Kock in the first warm-up game – the nine-wicket hammering of New Zealand – Hendricks and Rossouw opened the batting and put on 66 at 10-runs-an-over. It’s been six-and-a-half years since they played together in the Free State Knights team and Rossouw is hoping his former provincial team-mate can really announce himself on the global stage considering the great form he is in at present.

“Reeza and I go a long way back and it’s always nice to bat with him, he always brings something special,” Rossouw said.

“I hope he gets the chance to show the world what he’s about. We are all much better players than we were in those Knights days, we’ve learned from experience and from each other. And he is world-class,” Rossouw said.

With Tabraiz Shamsi returning to form superbly against New Zealand in their first warm-up match, the Proteas would dearly like captain Temba Bavuma to not only play but also get a good score behind his name in their final dress rehearsal for the T20 World Cup, against Bangladesh in Brisbane on Wednesday.

Bavuma has not appeared for the Proteas in two weeks due to illness, while before that he was out of action for two-and-a-half months with an elbow injury. He has struggled to find form at international level, scoring just 11 runs in four innings since his return to the national team.

So it would really solve an awkward selection dilemma if the captain can produce the goods against Bangladesh at Allan Border Field on the eve of the tournament starting. Everything else looks in place for their opening match on Monday against the top side in qualifying Group B, in which Scotland and Zimbabwe currently have wins over the West Indies and Ireland respectively.

Having spearheaded the nine-wicket win with 52 balls to spare against New Zealand in the Proteas’ first warm-up match, spinners Shamsi and Keshav Maharaj are once again the talk of the towns, enjoying the bigger Australian fields after being taken apart at times on their tour of various smaller Indian grounds.

While Wayne Parnell swung the ball up front to take wickets in his opening two overs, reducing New Zealand to 11/2, the Kiwis recovered to 52/2 after seven overs when Shamsi came on. He dismissed the big-hitting Glenn Phillips with his second ball, then bowled a wicket-maiden in his second over, and rested with outstanding figures of 3-1-6-2.

With Maharaj (3-0-17-3) taking a wicket in each of his three overs, New Zealand lost their last eight wickets for 45 runs in one ball short of 10 overs.

It was an apt reminder of how South African spin has dominated T20s against everyone except India.

“The pitch was a bit slow and that allowed us to utilise spin, but the tone was set up front and we were very disciplined in the field,” Maharaj said. “We know Shamo is world-class and it was good to see him back to his best.

“I know he has a big hand to play if we are going to progress on to bigger things in this World Cup. We were very professional and it’s important for the two warm-up games to create some momentum for us.”

The International cricket stage is not the sort of place Joe Soap batsmen just come in and automatically do well and the recurring failures of the Proteas batting line-up this year showed that there is something more systemic to blame for the several dreadful collapses we have seen.

In the last 12 months, South Africa have been bowled out in Test cricket for scores of 95 and 111 in New Zealand, 118, 151, 169 and 179 in England, and 191 and 197 against India at Centurion. In ODIs, England have bundled them out for 83 and India shot them out for 99 earlier this week, while 154 all out against Bangladesh at SuperSport Park was a shock. In T20s, there was 87 all out and 106/8 in India, and 118/9 in the opening match of last year’s World Cup, against Australia in Abu Dhabi.

Some of these same batsmen that have been exposed a few times against overseas opposition take delight in scoring heavily in domestic cricket, and that is where Cricket South Africa need to look first.

The expansion from six to eight teams at the top level and the unfortunate fact that probably two-thirds of the transformation targets per team are filled by bowlers, has led to a dilution of the strength of bowling attacks in the local game.

Having watched plenty of domestic cricket in recent times, it is apparent that, for top batsmen, there is probably a pair of pacemen and maybe a spinner who will provide a suitable test for their abilities, but thereafter there is a drop in intensity and a batter who has international aspirations finds it relatively easy to rack up big scores.

The quality of pitches also needs to be looked at: We have had a few ‘roads’ around the country which barely test a batsman, and green tops and rank turners don’t help either because they lower the overall quality of the bowling by not forcing bowlers to develop the skills and patience required on the generally good wickets at international level.

And, as both England and India’s bowlers have capitalised on, there is precious little quality swing bowling seen in South Africa these days; gone are the likes of Richard Snell, Meyrick Pringle and Alan Dawson, who were leading wicket-takers season in and season out.

The ill-effects of quotas on local cricket are obvious, but it also needs to be pointed out that the wretched system of Apartheid enforced a 100% White quota, which had even more of a sickening effect on sport. Quotas are there to try and redress that iniquity and level the playing field, and if anyone has a better method of doing that, I’m sure CSA would love to hear from you.

It has certainly not helped the domestic game that there have been drastic financial cuts by CSA. These cost-saving measures came about due to the incompetence and misgovernance of the previous board, which caused sponsors to flee en masse.

In previous times, new batsmen came into the Proteas team with three or four seasons of strength-versus-strength, hard cricket behind them. They would play a dozen matches per season per format. Now the domestic game is no longer contested on a home-and-away basis, and our top local cricketers play much less cricket, thereby reducing their experience and learning opportunities.

So what are CSA to do about this, to ensure that we keep producing great batsmen of the same ilk as Hashim Amla, Jacques Kallis, AB de Villiers, Gary Kirsten, Herschelle Gibbs, Graeme Smith, Faf du Plessis, David Miller, JP Duminy and Albie Morkel?

Hopefully the SA20 league is going to pump much-needed funds into domestic cricket to make it stronger, but CSA are also going to have to try and bring more of those illustrious former names into the fold to help advise and fine-tune our best young batsmen who are going to push for Proteas places in the future.