“Whatever you know about cricket, the moment you move into the women’s space you find out that you might know nothing.” – Dillon du Preez, South Africa interim coach
Telford Vice / Cape Town
HILTON Moreeng’s marathon of more than 11 years as South Africa’s women’s team’s coach is over. But who his permanent replacement might be remains as uncertain as it has been for the almost 15 months that CSA have searched for his successor.
Moreeng has been in the job since December 2012. His last match in charge was to have been the T20 World Cup final between South Africa and Australia at Newlands in February last year. But CSA’s failure to settle on a suitable successor meant he was retained on a series of interim contracts.
On Friday, CSA said Moreeng had decided to relinquish the position. Dillon du Preez, who was appointed assistant coach in September 2020, will step in until the end of the tour to India in June.
Last year’s final is the only World Cup decider any senior South Africa team, female or male, have reached. Moreeng took his team to four other semifinals in both formats. Under him South Africa won 84 of 149 ODIs and 60 of 127 T20Is, an overall success rate of 52.17%.
Moreeng was the first fulltime coach for South Africa’s women’s team. He was appointed almost a year before CSA first decided to contract women, and he was more or less a one-person support staff. Nearly eight years later, when Du Preez came on board, the team had a manager, a strength and conditioning coach, a doctor and a physiotherapist. Now they also have specialist batting and fielding coaches, with Du Preez taking care of the bowling. Moreeng has been an important figure in the successful metamorphosis of women’s cricket in South Africa from an amateur pursuit to fully-fledged professionalism.
“Whatever you know about cricket, the moment you move into the women’s space you find out that you might know nothing,” Du Preez told a press conference on Friday. “What Hilton has done for me has been amazing. I couldn’t have picked a better guy to learn from.”
But Moreeng’s team have outgrown him. In August, not quite six months after the T20 World Cup final, it emerged senior players had written to CSA to express their dissatisfaction with his methods, which they considered outdated. That was thought to be the reason for Suné Luus resigning the captaincy and for Chloe Tryon leaving the squad. The unhappiness has been reflected in the results — since the T20 World Cup, South Africa have won 12 games and lost 15.
The players’ problems with Moreeng weren’t personal. Instead, they felt he had run out of the kind of ideas they were exposed to in foreign franchise leagues. Given that delicate situation, had CSA consulted with the players to see if they were happy with Du Preez?
“We did acknowledge what transpired in the environment a few months ago,” Enoch Nkwe, CSA’s director of cricket, said. “We had a couple of meetings with everyone included, the management and the players, to figure out the real issues and what can be done in the short term. And also what can be worked on from a long-term point of view to try and better the environment and strengthen it.” Du Preez was more direct: “I’ve got the commitment from the management and the players.”
Considering Du Preez had been Moreeng’s assistant for almost four years, and seeing as his charges approved of him, had he been offered the position permanently? “Those are going to be the conversations that are going to be taking place,” Nkwe said. “We didn’t want to dump everything immediately. We also need him to understand if he would like to do this moving forward. There are also internal processes that need to be understood and respected. It was probably better to go the interim route while we’re trying to sort out a lot of those things internally. And to allow Dillon the space to think through things in the medium to long term. Maybe he puts his hand up and it’s a role that he’d like to take forward. Who knows. We’ll have to wait and see.”
Did Du Preez want the job permanently? “I think I will want it,” he said. “It’s too early to give you a 100% answer. But that’s where you want to be, at the highest level. I would really want to coach there; I enjoy it a lot. But let’s talk after India.”
Nkwe said in November that interviews for the position had been conducted and that Moreeng’s successor was due to be named before the tour to Australia in January and February this year. That did not happen, and Moreeng stayed on. “Unfortunately we couldn’t find fitting candidates to take the team forward,” Nkwe said on Friday. He added that Moreeng had agreed in January to “help us with the transition post the 50-over World Cup next year”. But said he changed his mind last month after Sri Lanka earned their first ever series win in South Africa, prevailing 2-1 in the T20Is, and drew the ODI rubber. “Unfortunately he came to the end of the season and felt he didn’t have it anymore to continue,” Nkwe said.
What now for Moreeng, who at 46 is far from at the end of the coaching road? “We would like to retain him in whichever way because you don’t just let go of such experience, especially in women’s cricket,” Nkwe said.
If Du Preez’ name sounds familiar to those who don’t remember him as a flashy bowling allrounder on South Africa’s domestic scene, it might be because he once had Sachin Tendulkar and Ajinkya Rahane caught in the slips with consecutive deliveries. He was playing for Royal Challengers Bangalore against Mumbai Indians in a 2009 IPL game at the Wanderers, and came within a centimetre or two of a hattrick — his next delivery hit JP Duminy’s pads too high. When Du Preez had Duminy caught behind with the second ball of his next over, he had taken three wickets for no runs.
Fifteen years and exactly one week later, Du Preez isn’t hitting the headlines that hard anymore. But, as Nkwe said, “who knows” whether he will again.
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