South Africa’s support staff will take 1 464 international caps into the series against England. Against India they had 266.
TELFORD VICE in Cape Town
JACQUES Kallis joined South Africa’s staff on Wednesday, taking to six the major appointments made from Saturday to try to pull out of a tailspin before the men’s Test series against England starts next Thursday.
A Cricket South Africa (CSA) release said Kallis had “been named as the team’s batting consultant for the duration of the summer”. He will join the squad, which was named on Monday, at their camp in Pretoria on Wednesday.
That follows the news that Charl Langeveldt would return home, which broke on Tuesday in Bangladesh, where he has been the national team’s bowling coach, on a two-year contract, since July 27. CSA sources confirmed Langeveldt’s involvement, although whether he will come aboard as a consultant or a fulltime coach remains unclear.
“I can confirm that we have received a formal request for [Langeveldt’s] release,” Bangladesh Cricket Board chief executive Nizam Uddin Chowdhury told Cricbuzz on Tuesday. “We value our strong cricketing relationship with CSA. We have also taken into consideration that he was a South African international cricketer and we understand his reasons for wanting to work with his own team. The board has decided to release him with immediate effect.”
Graeme Smith was unveiled as CSA’s acting director of cricket on Saturday, along with Mark Boucher as coach, Enoch Nkwe as his assistant and Linda Zondi as the independent selector. The addition of Kallis and Langeveldt means South Africa’s backroom experience going into the England series amounts to 1 464 international caps of all descriptions, or more than five-and-a-half times as many as the 266 they had at their disposal when they toured India in September and October. That served them well enough in a drawn T20 rubber, but they came badly unstuck in a Test series the home side dominated in all aspects and won 3-0.
Kallis was the pre-eminent allrounder of the age for many, and for even more he remains the best player South Africa have yet produced. In a Test career that stretched from December 1995 to December 2013 he played 165 matches, scoring 13 206 runs — averaging 55.25 — with 45 centuries and 58 half-centuries. All of those achievements are South Africa records, aside from Graeme Pollock’s average of 60.97 from 23 Tests. Kallis also claimed 292 wickets — sixth on South Africa’s alltime list — including five five-wicket hauls.
As a coach he took Kolkata Knight Riders to the 2015 Indian Premier League eliminator, where they lost to Sunrisers Hyderabad. What kind of skills coach he might make at international level isn’t known, but he is unlikely to add significantly to the verbal clutter of team meetings: Boucher has famously said he and Kallis, who are longstanding friends, are able to sit around a fire “for four hours” without uttering a word to each other.
Langeveldt, who played six Tests, 72 one-day internationals and nine T20Is, was among the best death bowlers of his era and took the first one-day hattrick for South Africa, against West Indies at Kensington Oval in May 2005. He became South Africa’s bowling coach after the 2015 World Cup and had a significant positive effect on the skill levels and variation shown by his charges. But Ottis Gibson was appointed head coach in August 2017, and South Africa’s dressingroom wasn’t big enough for two former fast bowlers.
Langeveldt’s return is likely to be the least heralded of the appointments South Africa have made in these breathtaking few days, but it could have the biggest impact. Unlike the other members of the six who have played at international level, he has also coached at that hot coalface. And with success. When push comes to shove at Centurion next week, that’s what will matter most.
First published by Cricbuzz.
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