Ken Borland

South Africa coach Russell Domingo on Monday defended his team’s tactical approach in the ICC World T20 in Bangladesh, saying AB de Villiers is “an impact player” who needs the game to be set up for him.

South Africa bowed out of the competition at the semi-final stage, beaten by six wickets with five balls remaining by India, but faced criticism in some quarters for their tactics, especially their decision to bat De Villiers at number five and only give Dale Steyn one over in the first 14 overs.

“AB is an impact player and the stats show – not just for South Africa but also in the IPL – that he’s more dangerous when the game has been set up for him. He doesn’t have the same game as Virat Kohli, he’s batted three with limited success.

“But it’s not about the number he bats, it’s about the situation when he comes in. If he walks out in the first over, I don’t think that’s a great time for him to bat, but if there’s been a good start then that’s a great time for him to bat.

“But if we have a 13-over partnership then there’s criticism that AB’s coming in too low, people seem to want our players to get out so AB can come in,” Domingo said.

De Villiers’ one notable innings at the ICC World T20 came in their last group match against England when he came in at number three in the 11^th over, after an opening partnership of 90 between Hashim Amla and Quinton de Kock, and blazed 69 not out from 28 balls. In his other innings he came in at four in the 11^th over against Sri Lanka and scored 24 off 16; at four in the six^th over against New Zealand and made five off six balls; at four in the fifth over against the Netherlands and scored a run-a-ball 21; and in the semi-final he came in at five in the 14^th over and made just 10 off eight deliveries.

The coach said the decision to hold Steyn back in the semi-final was due to batsmen having an extremely attacking mindset later in the innings.

“Dale can only bowl four overs and we need him the middle and at the end of the innings. We also need to set up the six-over Powerplay up front as best as we can, but we can’t bowl Dale one up front, just one in the middle and two at the death.

“So we decided we’d rather have guys like JP Duminy bowling at the start in the less-pressured overs and he only went for seven in the first over against New Zealand while Dale went for 17 in the first over against Sri Lanka. But the fifth and sixth overs are the most attacking,” Domingo said.

Domingo said overall he was “not displeased” by the way his team had performed.

“You’re always judged on your last game, but I felt we played some really good cricket in the tournament. In those conditions, probably the two best sides [Sri Lanka and India] made the final, but we were quietly confident going in.

“We’ve generally played good T20 cricket in the last year, we have a good playing strategy, we got to number two in the world, so there’s a definite upward trend. We lost the Australian series because we got beaten in a seven-over game and then played badly in the other match, but we had success in Pakistan and we beat Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka.”

Captain Faf du Plessis said he was also happy with the performances.

“It was really good to see a lot of character in the boys. Previously we’ve deserved a lot of criticism for how we’ve played the big moments, but to score 172 under high pressure in the semi-final, against those bowlers, was a really good effort.

“We made one or two mistakes on the night, but credit to a really good Indian team who were better than us on the night. But I’m really proud of the way the boys performed, I’m not disappointed at all,” Du Plessis said.

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Founded in 1866, the University of Stellenbosch, known as the Steinhoff Maties, are one of the oldest cricket clubs in South Africa and have been one of the most consistent performers in tertiary institutes cricket for several years.

They lost to Tukkies in the hard-fought 2013/14 final of the University Sports South Africa A Weekin Potchefstroom in December, their second appearance in the final in the last three years.

Maties have come off an unbeaten season in the Boland Premier League, winning the title for the third year in a row, and they have also made five appearances in the National Club Championships, finishing in second place to Tukkies in 2012 and to Constantia of Western Province in 1997.

Several of their players have donned Boland senior colours, most notably batting star Keegan Petersen, captain Emile Kriek, Dewald Botha, Jean Bredenkamp, Leon le Roux and Riyaad Henry.

The University of Pretoria cricket team, known as the Assupol Tukkies, have dominated club cricket in South Africa recently, but now they are looking to make their presence felt on a world stage as they participate in the inaugural South African finals of the Red Bull Campus Cricket Tournament.

Tukkies have won South Africa’s National Club Championships for the last two years, they have been the champion university five times since 2006 and have totally dominated the premier league of their province, Northerns, winning the title for the last five years, going unbeaten for 85 matches.

But the Red Bull Campus Cricket T20 Tournament provides new challenges for Tukkies and coach Pierre de Bruyn is unequivocal about how motivated his team are to succeed when they take on old rivals Stellenbosch University, known as the Steinhoff Maties, in the three-match finals in Pretoria on April 8 and 9.

“To be the first South African team to play in the World Finals of Red Bull Campus Cricket is a huge incentive for us. It’s an opportunity to play on a world stage, this is the Varsity World Cup. Just to get there and be one of the eight countries playing in England will be huge and we’ll be going there to win it,” De Bruyn says.

By rights, Tukkies will be favourites to be the South African qualifiers, given their recent dominance over Maties, but De Bruyn is wary of writing Stellenbosch University off.

“It’s never easy playing against Maties and it’s always been a big rivalry against them, a very competitive edge.”

“If we were playing long-form cricket against them I’d be a lot more confident, but in this format it’s always 50/50. You just need one or two individuals to come off and good sides get beaten, and Maties certainly have guys to make it very difficult for us,” the ex-Titans, Dolphins and Norfolk cricketer says.

De Bruyn is far removed from the reserved type of coach and he freely admits that he only had a relatively small amount of talent as a player, but he thrived on challenges and was the sort of tenacious cricketer who really bugged the opposition.

He is in charge of nurturing some of the best talent in South Africa and one of the first lessons he teaches them is to suck it up when times are tough.

Amongst the exciting talents in the Tukkies team are Theunis de Bruyn, the top-order batsman who turned 21 in October and has come of age this season, scoring half-centuries for the Titans on both his T20 Challenge debut and four-day Sunfoil Series debut.

Left-arm paceman Vincent Moore also played for the Titans and knocked over 10 batsmen in three four-day matches at an average of just 23.80.

Two of the stars of South Africa’s ICC U19 World Cup triumph, batsman and captain Aiden Markram and fast bowler Corbin Bosch, have also enrolled at Tukkies and those overseeing their development are perfectly happy that they are at the right place to make the most of their talent.

Batsman Sean Dickson, wicketkeeper Heinrich Klaasen and leg-spinning all-rounder GC Pretorius are also showing that they could belong in franchise cricket with their performances in the CSA Provincial competitions.

The one notable absentee from the Tukkies squad is opening batsman and left-arm spinner Regardt Verster, a member of the 2012 SA U19 team, who is constantly in the thoughts of his team-mates as he recovers from a serious car accident.

The form book is clearly in favour of the University of Pretoria as they have won the last three matches against the Stellenbosch students. They won the 2012 National Club Championships final by six wickets and beat them by four wickets in round-robin play in 2013. They then beat the Maties by 14 runs on the Duckworth /Lewis Method in the final of the SA Universities Week in December.

University of Pretoria squad: Gerry Pike, Aiden Markram, Theunis de Bruyn, Sean Dickson, Heinrich Klaasen, Johan Wessels, Tian Koekemoer, GC Pretorius, Corbin Bosch, Vincent Moore, David Mogotlane, Ruben Claasen, Bantu Dandala.

http://www.redbullcampuscricket.com/southafrica/latest/red-bull-campus-cricket-south-africa-tukkies/

South Africa coach Russell Domingo believes his team is “one of seven or eight” that can win the ICC World T20, despite suffering a hiding at the hands of Australia in Centurion on Friday night to lose their T20 series 2-0.

The Proteas leave for Bangladesh on Saturday and play two warm-up games against Bangladesh A and Pakistan before opening their World T20 campaign against Asia Cup champions Sri Lanka on March 22.

“There are seven or eight teams that can win the T20 World Cup and we’re one of them,” Domingo told a press conference in Centurion after the loss to Australia by six wickets with five overs to spare.

“It’s not a bad way to go into the tournament because the pressure won’t be there of being one of a couple of obvious favourites. We need a couple of players to do well, to have outstanding tournaments, and for the team to do well in the big moments and then we’ll be right in contention,” Domingo told a press conference in Centurion after the loss to Australia by six wickets with five overs to spare.

Domingo brushed off concerns that South Africa’s performances against Australia were indicative of a loss of confidence in the team.

“We’ve played good T20 cricket in the last year-and-a bit so there’s no need to make drastic changes. T20 cricket does have a lot to do with confidence, but we’ve been to world cups before extremely confident … ’’

The coach said the return of injured fast bowlers Dale Steyn (hamstring) and Morne Morkel (shoulder) would make a huge difference to the side. Both pacemen are expected to be fit for South Africa’s warm-up games in Bangladesh.

“This series has provided some answers for us. It has shown the impact of not having Dale and Morne. You can’t buy that quality and experience and it has highlighted how important they are,” Domingo said.

The coach said they would “not be losing any sleep” over the decline in the fielding standards of the team because “we have always been a quality fielding unit”.

http://www.iol.co.za/sport/cricket/proteas/proteas-can-win-world-twenty20-1.1661838#.UzMf-6iSy9A