Rabada cleans up again
BIG NEWS: MORE FRANCHISES FOR DOMESTIC CRICKET
Kagiso Rabada once again dominated the Cricket South Africa Awards dinner in Sandton at the weekend, collecting six awards to duplicate the record-breaking haul he collected in 2016, but the biggest bombshell of the evening came from CSA president Chris Nenzani.
In his presidential address, Nenzani made the shock announcement that the CSA executive had decided that morning to increase the number of franchises in domestic cricket, from six to an as yet undecided number. The move, ostensibly to “increase opportunities” for players, has been on the backburner for a couple of years and the current franchise CEOs were in the dark that the proposal was back on the table.
Rabada, who claimed a remarkable 72 Test wickets at an average of just 19.50 as he spearheaded South Africa’s series wins over India and Australia, and was also the Proteas’ leading ODI wicket-taker, claimed the overall Men’s Cricketer-of-the-Year award to go with the honours for Test Cricketer-of-the-Year and ODI Cricketer-of-the-Year, SA Players’ Player-of-the-Year and SA Fans’ Player-of-the-Year and also the Delivery-of-the-Year for when he bowled David Warner in the third Test against Australia at Newlands.
Captain Dane van Niekerk was named the overall Women’s Cricketer-of-the-Year, while the other major men’s winners were AB de Villiers as T20 International Player-of-the-Year, David Miller for the Moment-of-the-Year for his world record T20 International century against Bangladesh, and Aiden Markram, who won the International Newcomer-of-the-Year award after scoring exactly 1 000 runs in his debut Test season at an average of 55.55.
The other women’s winners were Laura Wolvaardt, who did the double of SA Women’s Players’ Player-of-the-Year and Women’s ODI Player-of-the-Year, and Chloe Tryon, who was named Women’s T20 International Player-of-the-Year.
Rabada, the world’s No 1-ranked bowler, has just started bowling again after a lower back stress reaction ruled him out of action after the Australian series, but he is looking forward to once more fulfilling his commission as South Africa’s lead strike bowler on the tour to Sri Lanka next month, and through to the World Cup in a year’s time.
“I will try and build on last season’s success. In terms of my injury, I’m taking it one week at a time and the plan is to be ready for Sri Lanka. It won’t be bad bowling there, but the challenge is always adapting,” Rabada said.