Kallis: It’s hard to drop ‘baggage’

SOUTH AFRICA’S World Cup “baggage” will eventually catch up with them, according to Jacques Kallis, who added that if there was a solution to the team’s problems, he and other greats who’ve been to World Cups before would have implemented it already.

In a column for Cricket Australia’s website, the great all-rounder claimed that South Africa’s reputation at World Cup events would eventually catch up with them.

“You enter a World Cup with no baggage, nothing weighing you down, convinced that every game will feel the same as the last. And for a while, that’s exactly how it is. The ‘reputation’ begins to catch up, however,” wrote Kallis.

The all-rounder who played 323 ODIs for South Africa and was involved in five World Cup campaigns, said there was no answer to the side’s “horrible record”, in the tournament.

“If there was an answer to South Africa’s horrible record in World Cups then I wouldn’t be writing about it, I would be helping to solve it. Actually, it wouldn’t be an issue because it would have been solved already.”

Kallis explained that there was no set formula for how to tackle a World Cup campaign.

“In five World Cup campaigns we spoke about playing games as though they were ‘normal matches’, and the first few always felt that way. But the closer we got to the knockout games, the more different it felt,” explained Kallis.

As for this year’s campaign, Kallis said South Africa’s two defeats to India and Pakistan were very different. They conceded too many runs against India in Melbourne and then executed the chase poorly against Pakistan last Saturday in Auckland.

“Massive totals of 400-plus in consecutive games (against West Indies and Ireland)... you can’t help wondering if they contributed to a feeling of over-confidence against Pakistan when they only needed 230 to win.

“When batsmen are caught on the boundary, hooking, with around four runs per over required, you know there’s a problem of some sort. It seemed like the obvious time to absorb some pressure from a rampant attack and try to draw their sting.”

South Africa missed the calming influence of a stoic Kallis-like innings in the circumstances, and he bemoaned the fact that the side didn’t recognise the force with which Pakistan’s quicks ran in. “The Proteas counter- attacked, which was admirable and would have earned much praise if it had worked, but instead it backfired and we lost.”

Not surprisingly, Kallis is still hopeful of AB de Villiers’s side going all the way to title in Melbourne on March 29. “It is absolutely possible that South Africa can win the World Cup. And it is equally possible that India can win it. But Australia and New Zealand remain the favourites in my book. Fortunately, as I know from experience, being favourites isn’t always the best place to be.”