SA’S warm-up gamble for openers pays off handsomely
COLOMBO: AS fully fledged practice matches go, SA’s only warm-up match before the World Twenty20 went as well as it could at the Colts CC yesterday. There were runs at the top of the order for the two out of form front men, Richard Levi and Faf du Plessis; delightful contributions from AB de Villiers and JP Duminy, and four wickets for Dale Steyn.
Add in a close nine-run victory, which was only this tight owing to Kiwi captain Ross Taylor’s lone blitz (75 off 42 balls, 2x4; 7x6), and coach Gary Kirsten was satisfied with his charges’ light run out that was initially delayed by four hours because of overnight rain.
“We definitely have gotten a lot closer to what our strategies are going to be,” said Kirsten.
“We move into the tournament now and really it’s just about getting our thinking and our execution right in the moments that count. But this was a great exercise today. I’m glad we had a close game and we had to defend this score.”
The match might not mean much in the greater context, but it did, however, give Kirsten greater insight as to where his team were just two days out from their tournament opener against Zimbabwe.
The composition of the opening pair for SA heading to Sri Lanka has been a source of great debate.
A settled combination has
Only one half of the pair is likely to play against SA’s northern neighbours, but Kirsten was sufficiently pleased with the progress during the first six powerplay overs.
Their ability to negate the spin threat of Nathan McCullum and Ronnie Hira during this period, and then begin to score freely had Kirsten smiling.
“We wanted to get Faf up there. It’s where he bats in the IPL and has done really well there, so we wanted to have a look at another option. But it was also just to give him an opportunity to bat, and he looked in good touch,” Kirsten said.
“Richie, too, he played nicely. Played the spin pretty well which was something we have been working on. We had to take four overs of spin up front in the powerplay, and we still managed to score 45 runs in this period.
“We have done a lot of thinking of how we going to counter spin in the opening overs, and each guy has worked on how he wants to play spin.”
SA’s one concern emanating from yesterday’s match was not about form, but fitness.
All-rounder Albie Morkel left the field midway through a bowling spell yesterday with a back spasm, leaving Lonwabo Tsotsobe to replace him and finish the over.
Kirsten was not overly concerned at the end of the match, and did not think it was any long term issue, like the ankle injury that kept the 31-year-old out of the recent England oneday international series.
Proteas team manager Mohammed Moosajee confirmed that Morkel would be monitored overnight.
“He [Morkel] first felt the pain when he hit the six while he was batting, but he thought that it was something minor,” Moosajee said.
“He aggravated it while he was bowling and came off to receive treatment from our physio, Brandon Jackson. We will see how he does overnight, if he doesn’t improve substantially, he will have to have an MRI scan.”
SA, 186/6, beat New Zealand 177/8 by 9 runs.