Ken Borland

The novelty value and excitement of being part of a greater Team South Africa at the Commonwealth Games will hopefully see the Proteas women’s cricket team return to their strengths and bounce back from a torrid run of six straight defeats against England when they play New Zealand in their opening game at Edgbaston on Saturday.

Team unity will seldom be more important for the Proteas as they are without most of their leading individual stars – Lizelle Lee has controversially retired, Marizanne Kapp is back in South Africa attending to a family emergency, Dane van Niekerk is still injured and Trisha Chetty and Tumi Sekhukhune are also unfit to play.

They have also been in England for a long time, suffering regular blows to their morale, and key players like Shabnim Ismail, Sune Luus and Mignon du Preez have been struggling for form.

Coach Hilton Moreeng has tried to bolster the mood.

“It’s very exciting to have this opportunity to be part of the Games, it’s a first for us and you can see the joy in the players, they know they have the opportunity to do something special.

“It’s a very happy camp and we feel blessed to represent Team South Africa. The main thing is we have acclimatised and we can adapt to conditions in Birmingham very well.

“Plus we’ve been playing against a very competitive team like England, who are always in the top two and they have tested us well. We’ve gone back to the drawing board to see how we can improve.

“We’ve learnt a lot playing against England and now we will use that to see how we can get victories in the Commonwealth Games. We will need to fire in all our disciplines,” Moreeng said.

While New Zealand have been inactive since the World Cup in March, it should be remembered that they beat the Proteas 3-1 in their previous meeting back in February 2020, clinching the series by romping to a 69-run victory in Wellington.

England and Sri Lanka are the other teams in Group B, so it is likely whoever wins Saturday’s clash between the Kiwis and the Proteas will make the semi-finals along with the hosts.

But New Zealand have been underachievers in global women’s events and South Africa will hope their greater match-sharpness will allow them to put their opponents under pressure.

Play starts at 12pm.

South Africans who love both their cricket and their rugby will recognise the similarities between what national coaches Mark Boucher and Jacques Nienaber have been doing with selection lately, and the Proteas mentor will probably have nine of his 15-man squad for the T20 World Cup in two-and-a-half months time already settled.

It was a typically ballsy call by Boucher to keep the same XI that were slaughtered in the first T20 against England for the second match, but it paid off as they kept the series alive with a highly-impressive all-round showing in Cardiff.

By resting players such as Aiden Markram, Rassie van der Dussen, Dwaine Pretorius and Anrich Nortje, Boucher has almost been fielding a second-string outfit, much as Springbok coach Nienaber did for the second Test against Wales.

But he will now know that explosive batsmen like Rilee Rossouw and Tristan Stubbs need to be part of his squad for the T20 World Cup in Australia, as does Lungi Ngidi (if there was any doubt). A player like Andile Phehlukwayo has been given a fair chance to also showcase his strengths, as well as his weaknesses.

Boucher will still, nevertheless, face some really tough selection decisions.

Reeza Hendricks, who seems to attract criticism as unfairly as Willie le Roux does, has justified his selection for the tour to England with wonderful back-to-back half-centuries, but will he be in the World Cup squad? The 32-year-old has really sped up his scoring rate in the two T20s against England, lifting his career stats to an average of 27.58 and a strike-rate of 124.71.

The other contenders for the opening batsman slot alongside Quinton de Kock are the injured Temba Bavuma (average 26.76, SR 120.60), Rassie van der Dussen (38.14 & 130.37) and Rossouw (35.58 & 144.25).

Will Boucher and the selectors be brave (or foolish) enough to leave out the appointed captain, especially given how important Bavuma is to the transformation agenda?

I have not mentioned Markram in this conundrum because he will be going as a middle-order batsman who is averaging 39.20 with a strike-rate of 147 and is third on the ICC rankings. He also provides the Proteas with a sixth bowler, which I still believe is crucial.

Van der Dussen is the next best South African in 10^th place and should surely be on the plane to Australia given how useful his ability to bat just about anywhere will be.

South Africans will fondly recall the exploits of their famous fast bowlers Down Under, but the nature of current T20 cricket will probably dictate that only three frontline pacemen will be chosen for the World Cup – Kagiso Rabada, Ngidi and Nortje.

Pretorius – remember he was South Africa’s joint leading wicket-taker with Nortje in last year’s T20 World Cup – and Phehlukwayo, who has taken 44 wickets in 37 matches, will probably edge out Wayne Parnell for the all-rounder berths.

Heinrich Klaasen, who has been in great form, will be counting on the Proteas taking two wicketkeepers to Australia.

It has also been good to see Keshav Maharaj and Tabraiz Shamsi affirm that they are still South Africa’s two best white-ball spinners.

Experimenting with players does not only confirm which ones are good enough for international level, it also shows the ones who are not yet ready for the step up, and this is more what Nienaber learnt from his selection gamble against Wales.

But you know your depth must be pretty good when players like Reeza Hendricks and Parnell, or Marcell Coetzee and Aphelele Fassi, are probably not going to make your World Cup squad.

Proteas captain Keshav Maharaj’s decision to bat first even though rain was forecast in the third and decisive ODI against England last weekend had its po-faced critics, but as he later explained it was done to ensure South Africa stuck to their strengths and their game-plan, which leans heavily on their spinners.

While the rain ultimately washed out the match and made the toss a moot point, when the T20 series gets underway on Wednesday night in Bristol, we can expect the Proteas to stick to roughly the same game-plan as they use in ODI cricket.

South Africa’s rise to fourth in the T20 rankings has been built around the strength of their attack, and Maharaj and Tabraiz Shamsi, number three in the world T20 rankings, have been key performers with their ability to both take wickets and stem the flow of runs. The game-plan has been the security blanket they cling to because it has carried them through some very tough times.

“We want to make sure we stick to our blueprint at all times and not go back into our slump,” Maharaj said.

“We really turned up to play in the last ODI, it could have been a spectacular end to the series, so it was frustrating to not get a result, but we can’t control the rain.

“The overhead conditions at Headingley told a different story, but the pitch was quite dry and we back our two spinners. We wanted to allow the wicket to deteriorate and use the spinners in the second innings,” Maharaj said.

Despite their awful collapse to 83 all out in the second ODI, the Proteas have built up some trust in their batting line-up. Aiden Markram (third) and Rassie van der Dussen (10^th) are both high in the T20 world rankings, while Quinton de Kock is 15^th and he showed in the final ODI that he still has that matchwinning x-factor.

“Obviously the batting collapse was not ideal and it was really disappointing after the spectacular batting in the first game,” Maharaj said. “The batting unit has generally been pretty good lately though.

“That first ODI was probably the most clinical we’ve been in the last 18 months and we want to replicate that in the T20s. Adapting to the pitch is the most crucial thing.

“It’s great to have Quinny back to his best too and his skill factor is one of the best in the world. He made it look much easier to bat than it was, and it’s always nice to see your senior players put their hands up,” Maharaj said.

David Miller is captain for the T20s and the series is likely to see the return of both Markram, who missed the India matches due to Covid, and Rilee Rossouw to the top-three of the Proteas batting line-up.

The Central Gauteng Lions did their bit for Mandela Day this week by packing boxes of food and hygiene products to be distributed by humanitarian aid organisations. A chain of players then relayed them from the field to the stands by throwing the boxes to each other. At the start of this chain was Lutho Sipamla, showing the sort of slick, consistent delivery that is demanded of Springbok scrumhalves.

Consistency is also what the 24-year-old paceman brings in his bowling; in his three Test appearances so far he has taken 11 wickets at an average of just 22.27. But he has also impressed with his ability to bowl regularly in a channel, which Sipamla believes is going to be important re the upcoming Test series against England, who have revitalised their fortunes with an aggressive approach to batting.

“Watching their past few games, whoever the bowlers, England have really come after them,” Sipamla told The Citizen. “Their brand of cricket has been a lot more attacking.

“So line-and-length is going to be really important and controlling your channel for as long as possible. It’s going to be about patience and sticking to simple plans.

“I think if we can do that, with our attack, then we can come out on top. Either way, I know I would have really learnt a lot by the end of the tour,” Sipamla said.

Given his inexperience at international level, there is little doubt England’s aggressive batsmen will target Sipamla, but the Port Elizabeth product says he is happy to carry the fight to the batsmen if they do go after him.

“If the batsmen do show a lot of intent, then you have your zone as a bowler and if the batsman makes a mistake then he gets out; that’s my game-plan,” Sipamla said.

“I like the challenge of it being you against the batsman, that contest in the moment, I want to own and win the battle.”

The other thing Sipamla wants is to enjoy a proper cricket tour to one of the great homes of the game.

“Grey High School went on a tour of England in 2016, my matric year, but this will be my first proper international experience and I’m really looking forward to it,” Sipamla said.

“Just to see England and explore it and the touring side of life, I’m just going to enjoy it because it’s going to be great to be back. There’s a lot to do in England.

“And the Tests are at such historic grounds [Lord’s, Old Trafford and the Oval] and to be at Lord’s is going to be unbelievable. I know our pace attack and what they have in the bag, and what better place to show it,” Sipamla said.