Ken Borland

The five-match T20 series that the Proteas will play in India from this week is going to be a vital time of getting the combinations and plans right ahead of the World Cup in Australia in October, the all-rounder Dwaine Pretorius said on Monday.

The series starts on Thursday in Delhi, with nine of the South African squad having seen action in the recent Indian Premier League. Pretorius played half-a-dozen matches for the Chennai Super Kings, one of the franchises at the forefront of T20 development, under the leadership of Mahendra Singh Dhoni.

“We’re going to be testing ourselves against some of the best cricketers in the world in the Indian team and winning the series is important so we take positive momentum into the World Cup,” Pretorius said on Monday.

“Both teams will be looking carefully at this series and seeing who can secure spots in the World Cup team. India are a very strong T20 team and we’ve come a long way too.

“This is a chance to measure ourselves against one of the best, to see where we are and what we need to work on before the World Cup. There are a lot of benefits to this series, we will see what combinations and plans work.

“Indian conditions have changed a bit and apparently we will have good pitches in the five different venues; everyone knows that Australia will have good bounce and good wickets,” Pretorius said.

The chief takeaway for Pretorius from his IPL experience and interacting with the brilliant cricketing brain of Dhoni was the importance of staying calm and positive.

“My first IPL was a great experience, it’s been one of my bucket list items since I was 20 and it was hosted by South Africa. I was very glad to have the opportunity to play for CSK, one of the most successful teams.

“As players, we were given a lot of responsibility and to play under M.S. Dhoni and see just how big his brand is and what he’s done for Indian cricket was awesome.

“CSK has a very experienced set-up and the biggest thing I learnt from Dhoni was how calm he is. He takes the pressure away from himself by putting it on the bowler.

“He made me realise that the bowler is the one under pressure. It was a change of mindset, he’s always very optimistic and believes any game can be won by staying calm,” Pretorius said.

New Zealand may be the reigning world Test champions, but the weight of history is against them as they start a two-Test series against South Africa at the Hagley Oval in Christchurch at midnight on Wednesday evening South African time.

In the 16 series played between South Africa and New Zealand since 1931/32, the Proteas have won 13 of them and three have been drawn. Even at home, the Kiwis have only managed to draw two of the eight series.

The absence of the best Black Caps batsman and the regular captain, Kane Williamson, as well as Trent Boult, the fourth New Zealander to take 300 Test wickets, who is missing the first Test for the birth of his third child, levels the playing field even more.

But the Kiwis are the masters of playing in their own conditions, especially since South Africa’s last tour, in 2016/17, when New Zealand probably would have drawn the series 1-1 were it not for the last day of the final Test being washed out.

“I was aware that New Zealand have never beaten us in a series,” Rassie van der Dussen said on Tuesday, “but the team hasn’t spoken about it. We know our teams have been really successful here in the past, probably because conditions favour seam bowling.

“It’s a bit different in this series though, because New Zealand are the defending Test champions and they have been really successful over the last couple of years, especially at home.

“They have played at home a lot and they really know the conditions, which are quite good for seam bowling. There’s not much spin, but there’s quite a bit of bounce and the pace of the pitch needs some getting used to.

“The pitches always look very green and grassy, but the surface is quite hard underneath, which makes for consistent pace and bounce. The conditions favour swing and we know that’s the big challenge,” Van der Dussen said.

The way South Africa’s batsmen grinded their way to victory over India gives them a template for success, however. Their leading run-scorer, Keegan Petersen, has not been able to travel to New Zealand though because of a positive Covid test, clearing the way for Sarel Erwee to make his Test debut.

Van der Dussen said the way the left-hander has accumulated thousands of runs in domestic cricket suggest he will find a way to prosper at Test level as well.

“Sarel is a very experienced domestic cricketer and he has toured with us for the last year. He knows how to bat long and how to score big runs.

“For me, the step up to Test cricket was all about keeping the fundamentals the same, although there is more skill and intensity from the bowlers.

“Debut or not, he knows what his game is about and he has nothing to prove because we know what type of player Sarel is,” Van der Dussen said.

The brave captaincy of Nicky van den Bergh and the outstanding bowling of his spinners led the North-West Dragons to a surprise 11-run win over the Central Gauteng Lions, the winners of the CSA T20 Challenge in the previous season.

Sent in to bat at St George’s Park, the Dragons could only muster 136/6, and that was thanks to the heroics of the seventh-wicket pair of Nono Pongolo (27* off 21) and Duan Jansen (32* off 18), who shared an unbeaten partnership of 57 off just 37 balls.

Seamer Codi Yusuf was the best of the tidy Lions attack with 2/21 in his four overs.

Left-arm spinner Johannes Diseko was then the star of the superb North-West bowling performance.

Opening the bowling, Diseko removed both Dominic (4) and Reeza Hendricks (0) with successive balls of his second over to immediately rock the Lions chase.

Josh Richards (23) and Mitchell van Buuren then added 50 for the third wicket, before 19-year-old leg-spinner Caleb Seleka removed Richards.

Van den Bergh backed his unheralded spinners to bowl at the death, with the Lions needing 45 runs in the last five overs with seven wickets in hand and Van Buuren set.

And it was a masterstroke as Seleka (4-0-23-2) conceded just seven runs and took a wicket in the 18^th over, and Diseko (4-0-17-2), darting the ball into the blockhole, also gave away just seven runs in the final over.

Van Buuren finished with a fine 65 not out off 56 deliveries, but he got a little stuck towards the end against the spinners and the left-arm angle of paceman Duan Jansen (4-0-24-0).

Left-arm spinner Senuran Muthusamy also bowled well, conceding just 19 runs in three overs.

The KZN Dolphins showed they are going to be a force on the slowish St George’s Park pitch as they hammered the Free State Knights, winners of the CSA Provincial T20 Cup at the start of the season, by eight wickets with two overs to spare.

The Dolphins spinners restricted the Knights, who had chosen to bat first, to 128/5, with off-spinner Prenelan Subrayen’s 1/13 in four overs a particularly telling effort.

Raynard van Tonder’s 38 and Farhaan Behardien’s 36 not out were the main contributions for Free State.

Keegan Petersen then stroked a confident 45 off 37 balls to set up a comfortable KZN chase, adding 74 for the first wicket with Grant Roelofsen (27).

David Miller then finished the game off with a quickfire 34 not out off 22 deliveries.

Rugby made the front pages of the celebrity magazines this week with the news that Prince Louis, the three-year-old son of Prince William and Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge, loves playing the sport although his mother is a little concerned with how he always seems to be “in the middle of everything”.

It reminds one of South Africa’s very own modern-day prince of the backline, Lukhanyo Am. But while Prince Louis’ involvement is described as “kamikaze” by his mother, Am’s impact on the rugby field is anything but.

The much-loved Springbok and Sharks centre is a hugely influential player and leader for both teams. But he fulfils both roles with such calm, unflustered assurance that he seems to be gliding around the field, and he is definitely someone who leads by quiet, stellar example rather than by stirring words.

And his own mother, Zukiswa, still features large in his life. As do his siblings.

Now an international star and a certainty for most sensible peoples’ World XV (some even tipped him to be World Player of the Year for 2021), Am is a celebrity in his own right and in his own modest, self-effacing way.

With Sharks CEO Eduard Coetzee confirming that their salary to Am is based on their belief that he is the best outside centre in the world, the 28-year-old could spend his time away from rugby doing any manner of glamourous, exotic pursuits. But in lieu of the bright lights of fame, he returns to family and the values that were inculcated in him from a young age.

“Off the field, I’m very much a family man. My Mom and my siblings, and my extended family, that’s where my heart is,” Am told The Citizen. “Whenever I get a break from rugby, with all the travel we do anyway, I don’t take vacations.

“If I want to feel refreshed, I go where I came from – King Williams Town – and just relax with my family.”

While he is in Durban, on duty for the Sharks as he has been since joining the franchise in 2015, Am has similarly calming ways of getting away from rugby.

“The coaches are usually drilling us in training,” Am smiles, “so days off are all about recovery, relaxing and just spending time off the legs. We are very fortunate with the weather here in Durban and having the ocean right here. A good beach walk really helps me to switch off.”

And it’s little wonder that Am needs time to switch off because that astute rugby brain is constantly organising, analysing and adapting to what comes up on the field. Am reads the game so brilliantly that one is reminded of how Naas Botha used to pull the strings for the Bulls and the Springboks back in the day. Am does not use his boot as often, but his vision in terms of defence and attack is second to none.

The fierce focus the De Vos Malan High School product brings to the game applies to both matchday and the training field.

“Now that I’ve managed to establish myself I’m in a really happy space,” Am says. “My focus is on my goals, which are controlling my performance and improving my game each time I am on the field.

“As soon as the season is starting with the Sharks, my focus is on being the best I can be and then transferring that to the national side. But I don’t look too far ahead because of the different challenges we face nowadays and there is always the risk of injuries.

“I just work on being the best I can be. I’ve always been that way, my focus is on my performance and doing the right things right. Making sure everything is in place to do that. That is what has worked really well for me in the past.

“I take it a game at a time, and then focus on the next one. I analyse myself, where I am at in my game and where I want to be. I just try to tick those small boxes,” Am said.

Despite being raised in the troubled, poverty-stricken surrounds of Zwelitsha in the 1990s, Am was a lover of sport from a young age.

“At school, I was a sports fanatic, those are the memories I have of growing up. Playing cricket, watching athletics, the most fun was always on Saturdays.

“I played cricket until the end of high school. It was a 90s thing: cricket, soccer and rugby were everywhere in the township and when I went to high school I was already comfortable in all three sports.

“I was actually very passionate about my cricket, but as I got older, so rugby took over me. I guess because I was strong at a young age,” Am said.

He also has a most mature head on young shoulders, a characteristic which comes through in aspects of his life outside of rugby.

“Relaxing at home, I listen to tunes. But I guess I’m an old soul because I like things like deep house. But I have no specific favourite genre, I’ll pick whatever goes with my emotion at the time.

“Whatever will calm or relax me, whatever is relevant to how I’m feeling at the time, is what I’ll listen to.”

It’s a thoroughly sensible way of looking at the world. But then again, Lukhanyo Am is a thoroughly sensible person; a top-class rugby player and a wonderful human being.