Ken Borland

Assupol Tuks coach Pierre de Bruyn was a satisfied man yesterday evening after his team beat NMMU George by seven wickets to seal their place in today’s Momentum National Club Championships final at SuperSport Park.

The victory left two-time defending champions Tuks unbeaten and at the top of Section Two, meaning they will take on the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University Madibaz, the students from the Port Elizabeth campus, who came through Section One with a similar record, in today’s final.

“We set ourselves the tremendously high goal going in of achieving a hat-trick of titles and we said we had to go through the first five days unbeaten to do that.

“We are unbeaten, which makes it 17 games in a row at club champs, and now there’s the big one to go tomorrow,” De Bruyn told The Pretoria News yesterday.

“We probably had the easier pool, but there were areas in which we were tested and I was happy to see how we responded.”

Tuks lost the toss yesterday against NMMU George and had to bowl first, and this time leg-spinner Tertius Gouws was the man to shine as he took four for 27 in 10 excellent overs to limit the South-Western Districts champions to 171.

Neil Hornbuckle (36), Tyron Walsh (36) and Hendrik Kotze (33) provided islands of resistance, but no-one else reached double figures as the George students were bowled out in 45.2 overs.

Paceman Gerhard Linde claimed an impressive three for 23 in 8.2 overs, but Graeme van Buuren (8-1-27-0), Ruben Claasen (7-1-14-1) and Johan Wessels (5-0-18-1) were also effective.

Wessels then also starred with the bat as he safely steered Tuks to their target in just the 35^th over with a swift 69.

Captain Heinrich Klaasen applied the finishing touches with 53 not out and he hit the winning runs that put Tuks into their third successive final, and a repeat of last year’s title decider against the Port Elizabeth students.

The NMMU Madibaz outfit is a potent one, with their spin bowlers – Simon Harmer and Brad and Josh Dolley – a real threat.

Opening batsman David White is one of the most exciting young players in the country, while his partner Ed Moore is once again in fine form at this tournament.

The University of Pretoria students are going to be under increased pressure today, but then again they came through a tough situation on Saturday in their crunch game against Maties.

Chasing 207, they had crashed to 107 for five, but Sean Dickson anchored the innings with a determined, match-winning 74 and there were important contributions too from Tian Koekemoer (29) and Sean Nowak (19*), who had earlier been the best bowler with three for 20 in 10 overs.

“We were tested the whole game against Maties, but we’ve trained those situations, like chasing 20 off 20, and we stood up and really believed we could do it,” De Bruyn said.

Results

Yesterday: Section One – University of Free State Kovsies 307-5 (Jacobus Dreyer 120, Dirk Bruwer 49 not out) Crusaders 246 (Michael Alexander 70, Robbie Clift 68, Jason Biddulph 40; Leonard Killeen 4-61) University of Free State Kovsies won by 61 runs. University of Jhb 73 (Brad Dolley 5-11) NMMU PE Madibaz 75-0 NMMU PE Madibaz won by 10 wickets. NWU Pukke 370-7 (Grant Mokoena 105, Righardt Frenz 81, Wihan Lubbe 57; Gerhardt Abrahams 4-51) West End 274-6 (Xander Pitchers 62, Roche Rossouw 47, Gerhardt Abrahams 76) NWU Pukke won by 96 runs. Section Two – NMMU George 171 (Tertius Gouws 4-27) Tuks 173-3 (Johan Wessels 69, Heinrich Klaasen 53 not out) Tuks won by 7 wickets. Kempton Park 67 (Dewald Botha 5-10) Maties 70-3 Maties won by 7 wickets. United CC 112 (Romano Esau 53) Cape Town CC 113-4 Cape Town CC won by 6 wickets.

Saturday: Section One – Crusaders 218-9 University of Jhb 203 (Umar Asad 57 not out, Harry van Straaten 42, Neels Bergh 41; Jared van Heerden 4-47) Crusaders won by 15 runs. West End 139 (Gihahn Cloete 40 not out; Brad Dolley 4-35) NMMU PE Madibaz 141-4 (Lloyd Brown 51 not out) NMMU PE Madibaz won by 6 wickets. NWU Pukke 332-7 (Ludwig Roos 103, Grant Mokoena 82, Righardt Frenz 74) University of Free State Kovsies 243 (PJ Jansen 101; Bjorn Fortuin 4-56) NWU Pukke won by 89 runs. Section Two – Maties 206-9 (Dewald Botha 58) Tuks 207-7 (Sean Dickson 74) Tuks won by 3 wickets. United CC 182 (Romano Esau 64, Marco Marais 53; Lance Roelfse 5-47, Bronwell Goeda 4-35) NMMU George 183-6 (Tyron Walsh 68 not out) NMMU George won by 4 wickets. Kempton Park 179-9. Cape Town CC 162 (Marc de Beer 40; Jurie Snyman 4-33) Kempton Park won by 17 runs.

Sixes are a relatively old concept in cricket, with the famous Hong Kong Sixes being held since 1992, but they have never really caught on in South Africa. That could be about to change thanks to Titans cricket introducing the Global Softech Sixes, to be hosted by SuperSport Park from September 4-7.

Sixes are certainly part of mainstream cricket elsewhere in the world, with Glenn Maxwell, currently Australia’s most destructive batsman, the player of the tournament in the 2010 Hong Kong Sixes, while Pakistan star Umar Akmal has won the same award in the last two editions at Kowloon.

The Titans see the Global Softech Sixes as an ideal starter for the 2014/15 season and as a chance to develop the game elsewhere in Africa as Tanzania, Uganda, Namibia, Zimbabwe and Kenya have all been invited to take part.

The first two days of the competition will be played as an inter-franchise event, with the Titans, Cape Cobras, Dolphins, Knights, Highveld Lions and Warriors all taking part, before a South African side joins the five other countries in a two-day international competition.

Titans CEO Jacques Faul, whose brainchild the event is, promised plenty of fun and games over the four days in Centurion.

“It’s a unique opportunity to pioneer our sport to a younger generation and bring in a fun element, as well as embracing our neighbours from the broader African continent. We’re planning some new and fresh ideas, so the tournament will evolve and hopefully develop into a full circuit one day,” Faul said at the unveiling of the tournament at SuperSport Park yesterday.

Each match will be completed quickly in 40 minutes and smaller boundaries will add to the frenetic action.

Faul said he envisaged ticket prices being the same as for domestic cricket and there will be full coverage of all four days on SuperSport “so we can reach as far as we can with this new concept”.

The Titans CEO is hopeful that a posse of Proteas will take part in the pre-season event, even though South Africa’s ODI squad will be completing their triangular series in Zimbabwe that weekend.

The Global Softech Sixes do, however, have the full backing of Cricket South Africa, according to their CEO, Haroon Lorgat.

“Jacques has been working on this for a long time and it’s an opportunity to develop the sport as well as provide some fun and entertainment. We wish the Titans well with their initiative, we are very pleased to be associated with it and we will provide whatever support is needed. It’s probably the right time for Cricket South Africa to become more involved with Africa cricket,” Lorgat said.

When Unlimited Titans coach Rob Walter sat down on the SuperSport Park outfield with his team as the sun disappeared over Wierda Park after the third day of their final Sunfoil Series match against the Warriors, he no doubt stressed the importance of finishing the season well.

His team did that, fighting hard on the final day of the match for the second weekend in a row, beating the Warriors by 87 runs, to finish in a respectable fourth place on the Sunfoil Series log.

A fortnight ago, the Titans were firmly anchored in last place on the log, 13.60 points behind the Highveld Lions. Victories over the Knights and Warriors meant they leapfrogged both their neighbours and the Eastern Cape side, finishing just 5.88 points off the third-placed Dolphins.

Walter will be the first to admit his team erred badly in the opening stages of the four-day competition, especially in terms of their batting. Limited-overs cricket is clearly this Titans team’s strength, and it was perhaps understandable they took a while to get into occupying-the-crease mode.

But by the end of the campaign, a new four-day modus operandi was being implemented and the depth of the squad was also being established with several fringe players getting a run and many of them doing well enough to suggest they will be part of the Titans’ plans next season.

“There were a couple of things to get excited about at the end of the season, we were playing a better brand of four-day cricket and the right strategies were being implemented. We don’t want to make it too complicated, it’s a very simple game plan and it’s just a matter of executing it,” Walter told The Pretoria News yesterday.

“Young guys have also been doing well at the back end of the season, which shows we do have some depth and able replacements in most areas. The Cobras won the competition because their senior players stood up, but their depth also performed. It’s important that we improve our depth.”

Many critics questioned whether the Titans have the bowlers to succeed in four-day cricket, but they took 20 wickets in their last two matches on relatively flat pitches.

David Wiese, with 30 wickets in six matches at an average of 17.56, did a magnificent job for the Titans, while Shaun von Berg and Marchant de Lange did much for the connoisseurs of leg-spin and fast bowling respectively to look forward to next season.

“How David has grown from a skill point of view has been one of the highlights of the season for me,” Walter said. “He has outstanding skill, he’s good with the new ball or, as he showed against the Warriors, with a 65-70 over ball. So he’s able to bowl in different phases of the game and the key is his accuracy and consistency.

“Marchant showed his old self in patches, he makes it very uncomfortable for the batsman and even guys with a hundred were jumping around. That’s obviously exciting and he can be a real impact player for us moving forward, as will Shaun.

“By his own admission, Shaun struggled with his rhythm on the final day against the Warriors, but I’m very happy with the way he bowled this season. The next step in his development  is knowing what to do when batsmen come after him or when the ball’s not coming out great,” Walter said.

The alleged lack of batting depth in the Titans also seems to be overstated when one considers the runs made by Theunis de Bruyn, Graeme van Buuren, Grant Thomson, Cobus Pienaar and Qaasim Adams in recent weeks.

Young opener Ernest Kemm also had his day in the sun with 62 on the third day of the match against the Warriors.

Walter said that the competition for batting places next season would be healthy for the team.

“Theunis looked really good and it’s great that we have a couple of options in terms of opening batsmen. Dean Elgar won’t be around for every game, so we need to make sure that we have back-up. We have able replacements and they’ll also be pushing Heino Kuhn,” the coach said.

Pienaar and Thomson have also produced valuable bowling performances for the Titans and that only adds to their value, while the strong finish to the season made by Adams means the stocks are healthy in the middle-order.

“The four-day victories where you go the distance to win and put in the hard yards are definitely the most satisfying. And the fact we shared the Momentum One-Day Cup with a set of young players mixed in with the experience and had a good end to the Sunfoil Series with the same mix, is very encouraging,” Walter said.

David Wiese bowled the Unlimited Titans to an 87-run victory over the Warriors and into fourth place on the final log in their Sunfoil Series match at SuperSport Park in Centurion yesterday.

The Warriors, chasing a daunting 395 for victory, were looking likely to achieve the task as David White’s magnificent century took them to 253 for three when Wiese came back into the attack 45 minutes before tea.

By the tea break, Wiese had already accounted for Ryan Bailey (18), Somila Seyibokwe (5) and claimed the key scalp of White, trapped lbw by a yorker he might have just got a scratch on, for a fabulous 142.

The all-rounder, who has been far and away the Titans’ best paceman this season, then all but sealed victory with the wickets of Simon Harmer (1) and Andrew Birch (0) in the first over after tea, to leave the Warriors on 283 for eight.

The match-winning spell of five for 30 in seven overs gave Wiese the best figures of his 59-match first-class career – six for 59 in 16 overs – and he also took 10 wickets in a game for the first time, his overall haul being 10 for 111.

The last two wickets fell to Grant Thomson, the debutant who bowled a crucial pressure-building spell opposite Wiese before tea to go with his impressive contributions of 40 and 53 with the bat, and Shaun von Berg, the leg-spinner who battled on the final day and returned figures of two for 88 in 20.1 overs.

Barring some juvenile confrontations out in the middle while White and Jon-Jon Smuts were batting together, it was another gripping final day at SuperSport Park, much like the thriller last weekend against the Knights, which the Titans also won.

White, who top-scored with 85 in the Warriors’ disappointing first innings of 234, stayed at the crease for 313 balls, hammering 24 fours off 210 balls, and while he was there, the Warriors were very much in the contest and up with the required run-rate.

He had dominated the first three hours of play, driving and hooking in impressive fashion as he added 124 for the second wicket with Colin Ackermann (51), 57 for the third wicket with Smuts (28) and 50 with Bailey for the fourth wicket.

Von Berg bowled 11 overs for 46 runs in the morning, consistent bad balls meaning a release of pressure, but fortunately Wiese produced a brilliant performance in the afternoon, justifying his status as the leader of the attack.

The 28-year-old played just six of the 10 matches but finished the campaign in the top six on the wicket-takers’ list, with 30 at 17.56, finishing second to Kyle Abbott in the averages.

Titans coach Rob Walter has indicated that fixing their four-day form is his chief priority and he will be hugely encouraged by the last two performances, with many of the fringe players excelling to give the Titans three victories in the season, the same as the Dolphins.