Faf needs to makes his men merry again
NOTTINGHAM: Nottingham’s most famous son led a band known as the “Merry Men” charging around the local forests taking from the wealthy and giving to those who weren’t so well off. If legend is to be believed Robin Hood was a flamboyant sort, beloved by the ordinary citizenry and by his own merry men. Faf du Plessis certainly is held in similar high esteem by his men, but whether Robin ever faced as a big a test of his leadership as Du Plessis has faced this week is doubtful.
As a Test captain he already carries his fair share of responsibility and yesterday he admitted he felt the need to take on even more in the absence of coach Russell Domingo, who had to return to South Africa following his mother’s death.
“That stuff that’s been going wrong off the field, is not stuff you can plan for – they’re unforeseen circumstances. I didn’t expect (my) baby to come a little earlier, Russell’s not planned for the tragedy with his family, and then KG (Rabada’s suspension) ... this is a huge character test for us.”
Comparisons were drawn with the build up to the third Test against Australia in Adelaide when there was also a lot of distraction for the players. On that occasion, the team had already won the series – here they’re 1-0 down, they’re without a key member of the attack and there are concerns over their batting.
That’s plenty for any captain to take on board and there are a lot of expectations about how Du Plessis will engineer a turnaround in South Africa’s fortunes.
“We’ve been really successful at Test cricket, we understand where we made mistakes in the first game, it’s about how well we respond to that. There are a lot of references we can take ... that Australian series, there was a lot of tests for us as a team, it’s about knowing we can do it, and going into the next game and doing it.”
Du Plessis acknowledged it would be tougher for the South
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Africans in the second Test because England now also had confidence on their side after winning at Lord’s. “There were a lot of times England found themselves under pressure, the disappointing thing was how easily they got out of it,” said Du Plessis
“We didn’t take our chances. Catches will be dropped, that’s not the issue, it’s how you respond to them and we didn’t do that well. After lunch on the first day, watching from the side, I could see it was a little too easy for England. When they threw a punch back at us we just sat back and let it happen and expecting something to change and it never did. That’s where we let the game slip.”
JP Duminy was dropped from the starting XI while Duanne Olivier will play his second Test as Rabada’s replacement while South Africa were going to give some more thought to who to select between Theunis de Bruyn and Chris Morris. That decision would be based on conditions. England captain Joe Root, confirmed the home team will play the same 11 that won at Lord’s.