New coach keen to take South African cricket forward
THE CONCERN Gavin Hunt has over Bidvest Wits’ slow start to the season doesn’t give him sleepless nights, as he argues the Clever Boys have enough quality to shake themselves out of their slumber.
Wits have hardly looked like Premiership and MTN8 champions four games into this campaign. The Clever Boys were outplayed in the start of their MTN8 defence, going 2-0 down before beating Golden Arrows on penalties in the opening quarter-finals of the lucrative competition.
Cape Town City took it a step further and beat Wits in the opening match of their league defence at Bidvest Stadium, a venue the Clever Boys had turned into a fortress on their way to winning the league for the first time in 96 years.
A draw with their bogey-side Free State Stars in the league and a 1-0 loss to the Citizens in the first leg of the MTN8 semi-final put the Clever Boys in an awkward position, and they will look to get themselves ou t of that predicament on Sunday in the return leg in Milpark by overcoming the deficit.
“I am concerned, the results haven’t been there. There is no doubtabout that. But we also need to settle down and try to have a settled starting XI. There has been a lot of chopping and changing, not because I want to but because of a various reasons. We have to be better,” Hunt (pictured) said.
The tag of South African champions comes with more scrutiny. It’s something that could either hold the club back or push them to achieve more, depending on how they handle it. The hard-to-please Hunt will definitely push his players like he has before. He was quick to throw
“I’ve learnt a lot over my years as head coach of the West Indies and in my two stints at England,” Gibson said of his credentials.
As head coach of West Indies, he helped secure the T20 World Cup, combining a complex range of characters and skills into a cohesive unit. In the South African dressing-room, he may find less drama, especially as AB de Villiers has finally seen sense and stepped aside for Faf du Plessis to be the captain in 50-over cricket, too.
De Villiers is now available in all formats and that will be pleasing for Gibson, who took on a South African team missing the talisman on the recent tour of the UK. De Villiers had said that he would wait to know who would be the next national coach before deciding on his future, so one can surmise that he is motivated to work under the highly-rated Gibson.
“I was chosen as the person to come in and take the team forward and I’m absolutely looking forward to that and getting over there,” he said ahead of his final assignments with the England squad.
He will have precious little time to settle, with the first Test against Bangladesh starting at the end of this month. his new signings into the deepend so that those who did the job for him last year understand they have to do better than they did in their league-winning campaign to retain their places.
“There’s definitely that pressure, everyone is looking at us as the champions, and so it should be,”Hunt said. “But you want that pressure don’t you? We wanted that because it will drive us. So we are OK. We have big players who can handle the situation. It’s just a matter of the big players stepping up a little bit more. That’s what it is about. Once you have won a little bit in football, teams will want to do a little more against you. The desire to win against you is a little bit more. But so be it.”