Ken Borland

Tabraiz Shamsi has been in the shadow of Imran Tahir in white-ball cricket for most of his international career and is finally back in the Test squad after appearing in the longest format of the game just twice, in 2016 and 2018, and says he is eager to win games in all formats for the Proteas in the West Indies.

Shamsi has established himself as South Africa’s No.1 limited-overs spinner, winning the T20 Player of the Year award on Monday night and featuring in seven of their nine ODIs since the start of 2020. But it is his Test prospects which are perhaps most interesting.

The left-arm wrist-spinner took a wicket in each innings on Test debut against Australia in Adelaide in November 2016 and his second Test was against Sri Lanka in Galle in July 2018. Shamsi was threatening in the first innings, taking three wickets, and then added a single wicket in the second innings.

But that was his last Test appearance, although coach Mark Boucher did want to play him in a three-pronged spin attack in the first Test against Pakistan in Karachi in January, but Shamsi pulled out shortly before the toss with a back spasm.

“As far as the Test team goes, I feel like I have unfinished business, but I have to wait my turn and give it my all when the chance comes, I only think about winning games for my country. The role of a spinner is very important in the West Indies because their batsmen play calypso cricket, high-octane cricket, just playing shots. So a leg-spinner or a wrist-spinner can definitely turn the game there.

“It hasn’t been easy being behind Imran Tahir for so many years, just playing one or two games here and there, usually when we’ve already won the series. But you only really learn when you play regularly: If you make a mistake on Wednesday then you can try and rectify it on Friday and Sunday. Consistency of playing leads to better performances,” Shamsi said.

Confidence and consistent performances are certainly also products of having the same team together for a while and Shamsi is looking forward to the T20 squad playing some regular cricket now ahead of their World Cup in October/November. South Africa will play five T20s against the West Indies and three versus Ireland, as well as having series against Sri Lanka and India lined up.

“It will be nice to go into the World Cup with some confidence, but it is five months away. So I just want to keep improving and hopefully I’ll be in even better form then after quite a good last season. The World Cup will be in the subcontinent so this is a nice opportunity to fine-tune and come up with and perfect game-plans where the pitches are normally slow.

“We may get the same conditions at the World Cup so we want tough games now. The team maybe does not have a lot of caps, but we have all played a lot of domestic cricket. We know the skills in the squad and that gives us confidence, we know the firepower we have is really exciting. It’s not bad to be flying under the radar and I think we will surprise a few people,” Shamsi said.

Louis Oosthuizen joined the club when it came to South African golfers beaten into second place by Phil Mickelson at a Major championship when the American became the oldest ever golfer to win one of the sport’s four main tournaments with his two-stroke victory in the PGA Championship overnight at Kiawah Island’s Ocean Course.

If it wasn’t bad enough having Tiger Woods hogging most of the Majors in the 2000s, winning 12 of them including beating Ernie Els into second place in both the U.S. Open and the Open Championship in 2000, and winning the 2002 Masters by three strokes over Retief Goosen, Mickelson then beat Els by one stroke in the 2004 Masters and Tim Clark by two strokes at Augusta in 2006.

Oosthuizen was just marginally off his game in the final round of the PGA Championship, while his putter remained his most unresponsive club as he posted a one-over-par 73 in the final round to finish tied-second with American multiple Major winner Brooks Koepka. They each earned $1.05 million dollars.

While Mickelson is celebrating his own place in the annals of history as the oldest ever Major winner, Oosthuizen will be mulling over his fifth runners-up finish in the big four tournaments, having claimed the title in the 2010 Open Championship. But the 38-year-old can take some heart from the fact that Mickelson, who turns 51 on June 16, has finished second 11 times in Majors. But the left-hander has also won six Majors – the PGA twice, the Masters three times and the Open Championship once.

“I feel like I’m playing my heart out to get a second major, and I do know I have the game to do it. This was close. My game wasn’t great on the weekend, but it was better today than yesterday. So I just need to work harder on it to get myself in contention again,” Oosthuizen said after his round.

What shaped up as being a famous day in South African golf history, with three golfers in the top six going into the final round, ended as a disappointment, with only Oosthuizen challenging before once again finishing second-best.

Christiaan Bezuidenhout shot a 77 to slip into a tie for 30^th, while Branden Grace was in a tie for 38^th a shot back after a 78.

Danie van Tonder, in his debut Major appearance, shot 73 in the final round to finish tied-44^th, one shot ahead of Rory McIlroy.

Dean Burmester finished tied-59^th and Garrick Higgo, also on Major debut, shot an excellent 69 in the final round to climb to a tie for 64^th.

Replacement flyhalf Tim Swiel kicked a 77^th minute penalty and sealed a 25-22 win for the Stormers over the Sharks in their Rainbow Cup match at a wet and miserable Kings Park in Durban on Saturday.

The penalty was awarded when Sharks loosehead prop Ox Nche was caught scrumming in at a set-piece inside the 22. The Sharks then lost a lineout, for the fifth time, inside Stormers territory and spent the final minute desperately trying to run the ball out of their own 22 before a knock-on ended the game.

The Sharks started the game strongly and were 10-0 up after the first quarter as their dominance of the early scrum exchanges led to flyhalf Curwin Bosch kicking a phenomenal angled penalty from 60 metres out and Nche forcing his way over for the opening try.

But a patch of very poor rugby by the Sharks around the 25^th minute then saw the momentum shift and the Stormers gained the ascendancy for the rest of the first half. A couple of iffy tactical kicks by Bosch allowed wing Edwill van der Merwe to counter-attack from 65 metres out and he put in a brilliant run, helped by dismal Sharks tackling, and scored under the posts.

Van der Merwe scored a second try shortly before the break as the Stormers went into halftime with a 12-10 lead.

The contributions of loose forwards Pieter-Steph du Toit and Siya Kolisi in the early stages of the second half will please people who have the Springboks’ interests at heart, but it was Du Toit who made the more lasting impact and was declared man of the match at the end of the tight contest.

Du Toit started the second half superbly by surging over for a try from 30 metres out after hooker Bongi Mbonambi and scrumhalf Herschel Jantjies had combined well off a lineout drive, putting the Stormers 19-10 up.

But Sharks scrumhalf Jaden Hendrikse then took a quick tap-and-go at a penalty and passed out wide to Kolisi, who bumped off a tackle, made a break and then sent wing Yaw Penxe racing away for the try.

The Sharks scored again two minutes later in freakish fashion to take a 22-19 lead. The Stormers were hard on attack when a pass rebounded off the head of Sharks fullback Aphelele Fassi, who was always quick to get off the line in defence.

Fassi beat Van der Merwe to the ball, kicked through and scored. Some people may have been concerned about the legality of the try coming so soon after Du Toit had tapped a penalty, but he had already run five metres while the Sharks were retreating so the home side were not offsides.

But the Sharks’ ill-discipline cost them in the end as prop Thomas du Toit then blocked Pieter-Steph du Toit off the ball, allowing Swiel to level the scores in the 55^th minute.

A yellow card to wing Sbu Nkosi in the 69^th minute, after repeated team infringements, did not help the Sharks’ cause, and ultimately they were their own worst enemies with too many soft moments.

Scorers

Sharks – Tries:  Ox Nche, Yaw Penxe, Aphelele Fassi. Conversions: Curwin Bosch (2). Penalty: Bosch.

Stormers – Tries: Edwill van der Merwe (2), Pieter-Steph du Toit. Conversions: Abner van Reenen (2). Penalties: Tim Swiel (2).

The Sharks made a painfully slow start to their Rainbow Cup match against the Stormers in Cape Town at the weekend, which did not please coach Sean Everitt at all, but he was happy that his team showed the character to win in the end.

The Sharks were 17-0 down after 12 minutes but eventually triumphed 33-30 and were helped by the Stormers having to play with 14 men for 40 minutes due to two red cards (with replacements allowed after 20 minutes under the new trial laws) and 13 men for 10 minutes. The first of those red cards came in the 13^th minute when wing Seabelo Senatla clumsily upended fullback Aphelele Fassi in the air.

“Obviously we’re not happy with the performance but we’ll take the result and I guess it’s the sign of a good team that you can win when you haven’t played well. Thanks to our conditioning I thought we did really well at the end, especially in stopping their driving mauls. In the last 20 minutes we just could not get out of our 22, we just didn’t have possession.

“It was not the performance we wanted, but the positive is that the guys showed character, work-rate and effort. What was really pleasing is that we are not a team that gives up. The guys found a way to win and at times we moved the ball really nicely. We knew it would be an uphill battle against the Stormers with all their Springboks, but we need to be better,” was Everitt’s frank assessment after the game.

The hard slog for the Sharks began in the lineouts and they also conceded too many penalties. But the new trial laws allowing the Stormers to replace their red-carded players after 20 minutes most certainly kept the home side in the game. Although the new rules made his life harder, Everitt said he supported the change in regulations.

“It’s always tough for the spectacle when there’s an early red card and what Senatla did was not intentional, probably just careless, it was not malicious at all. Fortunately Aphelele was not injured. I think it’s a good idea that a team can change their red-carded players after 20 minutes,” Everitt said.