Temba Bavuma, Kagiso Rabada, and Dane van Niekerk would be well-known players wherever they were from. They’re major players on South Africa’s teams. However, oddly, their absences haven’t caused those sides’ results to plummet.
Van Niekerk was the captain of South Africa in both white-ball formats and retired in March 2023 with more victories than losses. Since then, her old squad has advanced to three World Cup finals in both forms.
Due to the absence of their most reliable batsman, Bavuma, due to a calf injury, South Africa won the Rawalpindi Test last month.
Rabada, the captain, was sidelined by a rib injury during last week’s Eden Park Test, where South Africa prevailed in a low-scoring thriller.
It’s not that nice and easy, of course. Van Niekerk may have helped South Africa win one or more of those finals. The Lahore Test, which Pakistan dominated, was also skipped by Bavuma. Rabada’s exclusion from tomorrow’s Guwahati Test can’t be good for the visitors’ aspirations of winning three straight Tests in Asia for the first time.
It is nevertheless true, though, that when players of that calibre are absent, significant gaps are left. How could instructors prevent their teammates from becoming fixated on the holes?
At a news conference on Friday, Shukri Conrad stated, “You have to instill a belief that whatever XI you put on the pitch has the ability to win the match.” Thus, the team and its depth are given a lot of attention. even outside of the squad. We simply move forward. We manage to overcome all challenges.
at September 2021, Van Niekerk played his last international match at Antigua in an ODI against the West Indies. During a dispute around her lack of fitness, she resigned. Since then, she has played numerous games for teams in Hong Kong, England, and Australia. However, her genuine return attempt began in October 2024 when she began playing for Western Province.
In all three of her list A innings for WP this season, she has scored more than fifty runs, ranking third in terms of runs scored and fifth in terms of averages. She smashed 51 not out off 29 with eight fours and a six in her most recent game, a Twenty20 contest against KwaZulu-Natal Coastal at Newlands on Sunday.
As a result, both teams were called up for the white-ball home series against Ireland from December 5–19.
“Her name comes with a lot of previous stuff in terms of her being captain and having done well for the team,” Mandla Mashimbyi asserted during a Friday press conference. However, her call-up is a result of the work she has done over the past two seasons.
We are all aware of her abilities. Her contributions to the game’s knowledge are well known to all of us. All she has to do is act. She should just concentrate on helping this squad win games, in my opinion.
She’s left a legacy. She now has another opportunity to prove herself. If she does well, it would indicate that our team is doing well as well. I don’t want to put her under any further pressure. She needs to try to win games for this squad just like everyone else.
Van Niekerk, 32, is still young enough to make a comeback. However, did Mashimbyi’s retirement stem from her concerns about the problem’s current state?
“A player needs to be fit for just three reasons, in my opinion. You must think like a cricket player, move like one, and look like one. That qualifies you as an athlete. I’d be pleased if you could accomplish that.
She can do it, based on my observations over the past few months. We’re good as long as she can move in the field, bat, think like a cricket player and look like one.”
South Africa’s dressing rooms are more politically charged than those in other countries. It will be intriguing to observe how Van Niekerk reintegrates herself and how Mashimbyi’s players, including Van Niekerk’s wife, Marizanne Kapp, cope with the return of a significant character they believed they had moved on from.
When Bavuma’s team aims to win a South Africa Test series in India for the second time in eight tries and for the first time since March 2000, they won’t have to deal with that kind of drama.
For starters, the pitch for the first Test match in Guwahati would, by all accounts, be more conventional than the horribly erratic surface that India’s hitters were able to overcome in Kolkata.
At a news conference on Friday, Bavuma stated, “I believe it will be a conventional subcontinental pitch.” “It should be good for batting on the first two days, and then on day three the spinners should come into play.”
At Eden Gardens, Gautam Gambhir acknowledged that India had been handed the surface they desired, but the bet backfired when South Africa won the toss and batted. The Indians collapsed for 93 when asked to score 124 in the fourth inning.
“The toss won’t be too big a factor, compared to Kolkata,” remarked Bavuma. That being said, you want to win the toss since you are aware of the benefits of placing bets on days one and two. That’s still a benefit, but it’s not a decisive element.
The fact that South Africa’s spinners took 12 of the 18 wickets that fell to their bowlers in Kolkata has received a lot of attention, and rightfully so. This helped to mitigate Rabada’s loss. But without Bavuma’s undefeated 55 in the second innings—the lone half-century of the game—the visitors would not have prevailed.
The South Africans would have been quite happy to have Rabada return to Guwahati. But, considering the situation, the conditions, and the stakes, Bavuma’s presence is more crucial to their cause.
India
