Jostling for places in SA’s World Cup squad has started
Selection in sport can be a bitch. Spiteful, unpredictable and mean. In a perfect world the best players earn the right to be chosen and all is fair in love and war. The cream rises to the top.
Except sometimes it turns sour, and timing can be everything when it comes to making the squad.
The jostling for places in the World Cup squad will be fascinating, and it will not only take place during the 10 ODIs against Pakistan and Sri Lanka in the first three months of 2019. Sparkling or dismal form in the new T20 League (if and when it happens) will be hard to ignore.
Christiaan Jonker blew his chance to impress when he came to the crease in Bloemfontein at 49/4 and blasted a risky 25 from 19 balls before perishing to a nasty swipe. Or did he? Coach Ottis Gibson is encouraging a positive, fearless approach in which counter-attacking features prominently. What might he have thought of Jonker’s courage and belief? He would have enjoyed it.
Heinrich Klaasen is in the uncomfortable position of having only backward steps to take. Currently, he would be in the squad. When Hashim Amla, Quinton de Kock and David Miller return, his opportunities will be limited. A couple of inconsequential contributions and suddenly his star wanes.
Sometimes selectors make a call from long distance and identify a player for the future no matter what his short or medium returns. Aiden Markram is that man.
Despite frustrating returns of 27, 35 and 42 against Zimbabwe his quality is backed with a belief that larger returns are inevitable. It creates an inverted pressure. Instead of having to play himself into the squad, he must deal with the fact that every breezy 30 might be contributing to a sudden, lastminute axing.
Dean Elgar’s omission from the final ODI against Zimbabwe best illustrates the brutality of selection. Having tirelessly campaigned to regain recognition in the ODI format after establishing himself as a Test opener of international repute, he failed twice and was cut for the final game.
Chasing 118 for victory in Kimberley he would have been a banker for an unbeaten 40 left to his own devices, but Gibson is seeking more than mere victory and Elgar paid the personal price with a wild, uncharacteristic carve to third man on four from seven balls.
If the Proteas need 118 to win in a must-win game at the World Cup, and Amla and De Kock are indisposed or bereft of form, there is no better man than Elgar to begin the chase. He has a top score of just 42 and an average of only 17.3 in his solitary eight ODIs, but he has scored 5,000 runs in domestic 50-over cricket at an average of 42 with five hundreds. What those numbers don’t reflect is the knowledge of English conditions and his record with Somerset and Surrey for whom he has averaged over 50 at a strike rate close to 100.
Elgar has not been “cut loose”, the selectors say, which is encouraging, but they are also hamstrung by the unspeakable
– Amla’s future. He will be 36 when the World Cup starts and his average over the past two years has been closer to 30 than his career average of almost 50.
Where is Chris Morris in the equation? Wiaan Mulder, like Markram, appears to have been “identified” as a preferred option. Did Khaya Zondo do enough as a reserve batsman? Or Reeza Hendricks?
Who are the replacement fast bowlers should Kagiso Rabada, Lungi Ngidi or Dale Steyn not be fit?
Players adopt different approaches. Some shrug shoulders with an “out of my hands” approach. Others make a point of saying “look at my record”. And a third, small minority group, are proactive.
If you were the convener of selectors receiving a call from a player who said “don’t leave me out, I know I can do it”, would you be swayed? There are 23 or 24 players in contention for the 15-man squad, depending on the tiny chance that Mr De Villiers might reconsider his international retirement.