Newlands – Batsmen Rilee Rossouw and Farhaan Behardien are expected to be included today in South Africa’s squad for the 2015 World Cup in Australasia next month. Cricket South Africa have organised a grand unveiling function of AB de Villiers’ 15-man squad at the VA Waterfront later today.
The remainder of the squad is the familiar faces that took the Proteas to the No1 ranking on the ICC ODI table only a couple of months ago and does not lend itself to any major other surprises in terms of either inclusions or exclusions.
Rossouw and Behardien have both not enjoyed hugely successful starts to their ODI careers – Behardien has two ODI half-centuries in 15 innings – but both showed sufficient promise during the recent trip to Australia to warrant selection for the World Cup. Rossouw, the Knights left-hander, has the “X-factor” to win matches singlehandedly like he showed during a T20 International in Adelaide when glimpses of his talent came to the fore during his blistering knock of 78 off 50 balls.
Behardien also proved that he could take his prolific domestic finishing ability to a higher stage when he clipped 63 off just 41 balls in the final ODI in Sydney, while his ability to deliver miserly medium-pacers is an added bonus.
However, there are injury concerns with JP Duminy until yesterday still wearing an ice-pack on his troublesome left knee while Quinton de Kock has not yet recovered from his ankle ailment sustained during the first Test against the West Indies in Centurion last month.
Duminy has been pencilled in to play the third match of the T20 series next Wednesday at Kingsmead in Durban, but could delay his comeback until the start of the one-day series against the Windies at the same venue a couple of days later. It is hoped that Duminy’s recovery process is by no means accelerated and that he only returns once he is 100 percent fit as the all-rounder is an integral part of the Proteas one-day gameplans.
The 30-year-old adds that much-sought after balance to the South African one-day unit through his ability to bowl quality off-spin during the middle overs, while he remains one of the premier finishers on the international circuit.
De Kock’s recovery process is underway, but the wicket-keeper batsman is a greater risk heading to the World Cup as he faces a race against time to be fit for South Africa’s opening World Cup tie against Zimbabwe at Seddon Park in Hamilton on February 15.
There’s no doubt that there would have been plenty of discussion surrounding De Kock’s fitness with the possibility of Dolphins skipper Morné van Wyk being selected instead.
Proteas coach Russell Domingo is not particularly enamoured with the idea of his ODI captain and current Test gloveman De Villiers keeping in the shorter formats, but has previously admitted that “he will be required to do it on the odd occasion”.
It is this thinking process that possibly closed the door on Van Wyk’s World Cup ambitions as the Proteas seem to be comfortable with De Villiers keeping until De Kock fully recovers.
After winning five successive ODI series, secured mostly through the top-order brilliance of De Villiers, De Kock, Hashim Amla and Faf du Plessis, Australia cruelly exposed South Africa’s deficiencies in the middle-to-lower order.
The series defeat highlighted areas for Domingo and the selection panel to address. It was not only his team’s inability to chase down totals after the “Awesome Foursome” were dismissed, but also the firepower that teams like Australia possess lower down the order with destructive hitters like Glenn Maxwell and James Faulkner coming to the crease at No’s8 and nine.
Although all-rounder Ryan McLaren has been a prominent member of the Proteas ODI squad over the past few years, his blowout in the New Zealand and Australia series with both bat and ball could prove to be really costly. McLaren took just two wickets against the Black Caps, averaging 29.50 per wicket, but more importantly proved very expensive as he conceded 7.37 runs per over.
His radar was equally wayward in Australia as he picked up just one wicket at the cost of 166 runs and again he was not able to contain the batsmen either, leaking 6.38 runs to the over. His contributions with the bat were minimalistic too, contributing just 14 runs
POSSIBLE WORLD CUP SQUAD
AB de Villiers (captain), Hashim Amla, Quinton de Kock, Faf du Plessis, JP Duminy, David Miller, Farhaan Behardien, Vernon Philander, Dale Steyn, Morné Morkel, Imran Tahir, Rilee Rossouw, Kyle Abbott, Aaron Phangiso, Wayne Parnell. - The Star