“You’re just like the other players, but it’s the pressure and responsibility you have to live with.” – Temba Bavuma on captaincy.
Telford Vice / Johannesburg
THE revolution came to Centurion on Thursday. It arrived before tea on the third and what turned out to be the last day of the first Test, and had moved on before South Africa beat West Indies an hour after the interval.
The revolution had a name. Or rather, names. Some of them were Tazmin Brits, Sinalo Jafta, Ayabonga Khaka, Nonkululeko Mlaba, Laura Wolvaardt and Ayabonga Khaka — members of the South Africa squad who are the only team from their country to reach a senior World Cup final; the T20 version, which Australia won by 19 runs at Newlands on Sunday.
This was revolutionary because the players had been brought to Centurion to try and drum up support for a men’s Test that had drawn but a sprinkling of fans. They signed autographs during tea for a queue formed by almost every spectator in the ground. That the match did not reach a fourth day saved the provincial union, Northerns, around R1-million, or USD55,000, in losses.
Not long ago women’s cricket was purely a developmental exercise in South Africa. It still doesn’t make money, but there is no doubt it has arrived in the national consciousness as a powerful and positive entity. Fans were charged just R30 — less than USD2 — to get into a T20 World Cup game, but it told its own story that a total of 69,914 turned up despite entry to women’s matches in South Africa having previously always been free of charge.
The women’s leap to prominence comes at a challenging time for their male counterparts. A few months ago South Africa’s men were on course to reach the WTC final and their direct qualification for this year’s ODI World Cup seemed assured. Now they are not going to the final and their World Cup path could well have to pass through a qualifier in Zimbabwe.
They have new coaches in Shukri Conrad and Rob Walter, while Temba Bavuma has replaced Dean Elgar as Test captain and relinquished the T20I leadership. Winning will keep questions at bay, but it’s at times like these that the cricketminded public need honesty and clarity. Are they getting it?
In some senses, yes. Here’s Bavuma on Thursday when he was asked why he took guard when South Africa’s second wicket fell with what turned out to be only 17 balls left in the Wednesday’s play: “That was the coach’s [Conrad’s] rule. From now on there’s not going to be any nightwatchman.” Even though Bavuma and Keegan Petersen were dismissed before the close that day, that’s honest and clear enough.
On February 17 Conrad made no bones about his reasons for reselecting Aiden Markram, who had been dropped for the Test series in Australia in December and January after going 15 innings without reaching 50: “People are always going to be behind Aiden Markram or they are going to say he flatters to deceive. I’m in the former group.” That’s also honest and clear, and Markram more than justified Conrad’s faith in him by scoring 115 and 47.
Kagiso Rabada saw in Markram’s performance a shining example of the bullish brand of cricket Conrad espouses: “The way that Aiden played — extremely positive, he had extremely good body positions — paid off for him. He is in form but he’s always looking to be positive. That’s the way he plays. But positive doesn’t doesn’t mean he was striking at 80 or 100. Positive means going out there and having a solid gameplan to be as effective as possible.
“Every individual is different. You can’t have every individual playing the same way, but if I look at Aiden and the way that he played, he was true to himself. The word positive is an encouragement to be yourself and to get the best out of yourself. Because, at the end of the day, cricket is an individual sport. Players have come this far playing the way that they play. You can’t expect Keegan [Petersen] to start playing like Aiden, but you can expect him to be positive and trust his gameplan for it to be as effective as possible.”
But matters can be less straightforward. For instance, picking Senuran Muthusamy ahead of Keshav Maharaj needed explaining. “Our plan was to go with seven batters, hence ‘Sen’ came in at No. 7 instead of ‘Kesh’,” Bavuma said. “We didn’t expect it to offer much spin, which was proven over the three days.”
The pitch favoured seam throughout, so Muthusamy bowled only eight of the 69 overs South Africa sent down in the first innings and none of the 41 in the second dig. It’s doubtful Maharaj would have played a bigger role, and Muthusamy’s non-Test first-class batting average of 30.91 is significantly better enough than Maharaj’s 22.87 for him to crack the nod on the terms stated.
But Muthusamy is no Ryan Rickelton, who averages 57.02 and has scored three centuries in his last four innings in first-class cricket that is not played at Test level. Why he was not selected as the extra batter appears to be tied to the fact that the gritty Petersen, who also missed the tour to Australia, but because of a hamstring injury, was picked as South Africa’s No. 5.
“Keegan has been an important player for us,” Bavuma said. “He’s come into the team batting out of position at No. 3. No. 5 has always been his position. You want to give a guy that opportunity in the position that he prefers.”
Bavuma is correct in that Petersen has been a vital steadying influence in a shaky batting line-up, scoring four half-centuries in 20 innings on mostly difficult pitches. But only 17 of Petersen’s 204 innings have been at No. 5. He made his debut in that position but by his fourth first-class match he was batting at No. 3 — where he has spent most of his career, including all of the 18 trips he made to the Test crease before Centurion. Before Centurion, Petersen last batted at No. 5 in December 2018, or 70 innings ago. To call him a career No. 5 is simply not true.
As for Rickelton, Bavuma said: “Ryan is bringing in the runs. Sometimes those things happen. You don’t always get an opportunity when you are doing well. You get an opportunity when you’re not doing well. With Ryan, he needs to keep his head down and, as he’s doing, keep putting in the work, and when the opportunity comes make sure he’s mentally ready for it.”
Tony de Zorzi topped the averages and was the leading run-scorer in domestic first-class matches going into the round of games that ended on Wednesday. He made scored 163 and 304 not out in his second and third innings of the season, but then scored nine, 13 and 18 in his only other first-class matches of the season before earning a Test debut at Centurion, where he batted at No. 3 and made 28 and suffered a first-baller. Maybe that’s what Bavuma meant about being given a chance when your form has faded.
South Africa’s new captain will learn that leading a Test team is more complicated than doing the job in white-ball cricket, and that if you keep winning you buy time and space to tighten the nuts and bolts and clear the hurdles as you go.
“On the bowling front we ticked a lot of boxes,” Bavuma said about the Centurion performance. “The guys ran in with aggression, and brought a high level of intensity and skill. With the batting there’s definitely room for us to improve. We need to keep challenging ourselves to keep improving. People always look at the batting to try to understand what kind of cricket you’re trying to play. We know we have that responsibility as batters.”
Bavuma himself lasted just three deliveries in both innings, suffered the only golden duck of his career, and scored no runs. He was nothing like the rock of South Africa’s middle order he has been for most of his career.
“When you’re a leader it’s important to stick to your leadership bargain,” he said. “But what can’t be forgotten is that as a batter or bowler your currency remains runs or wickets. You have to make sure you look after those departments and fix things as and when it’s required. However, people need to understand that we’re also human, because you’re not always going to get wickets and runs. You’re just like the other players, but it’s the pressure and responsibility you have to live with.”
Bavuma knows all about pressure and responsibility, and honesty and clarity. He also knows he will find out far more as his tenure unfolds.
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