Cape Town - Wanted: fast bowlers who can propel the South African Test team back to their former glory.
With injuries having hamstrung Dale Steyn and Vernon Philander’s careers over the last year, a new generation needs to back up spearhead Kagiso Rabada for next month’s two-Test series against New Zealand on home soil.
It is not clear if Steyn will be utilised in the unusual mid-winter showdown in Durban (August 19-23) and Centurion (August 27-31). He is currently playing in the T20 Caribbean Premier League, after a stint with Glamorgan in England’s T20 competition, and would not have had any first-class cricket before the Black Caps arrive in South Africa.
Philander, though, will get a chance to show his readiness for the South African A team against their Zimbabwean and Australian counterparts over the next few weeks.
The two-match four-day “Test” series against Zimbabwe starts in Harare on Saturday, with SA A travelling to Australia for another two first-class games Down Under. There will also be one-day matches played.
But Saturday’s four-day game represents a vital stage of preparation for the long Proteas summer ahead, with Philander at the forefront of the pace-bowling attack. A serious ankle injury kept him out of most of the India series last November and entirely from the England tour of South Africa.
He played three first-class games for Western Province and the Cape Cobras towards the end of the season, but now needs to make a big impact to claim a place in the Proteas squad for the New Zealand series.
With Steyn and Philander out, the Proteas Test attack was rather toothless against England, who piled on the runs in a 2-1 series victory over South Africa. It was only Rabada who kept them in check, and then produced the remarkable figures of 13/144 in the final Test in Centurion, which the Proteas won by 280 runs.
Morné Morkel was outstanding against India, even though he didn’t have much luck in the wickets column, but went badly off the boil for the rest of the summer and was replaced by Rabada as the leader of the Proteas attack in the absence of Steyn and Philander.
Perhaps the Proteas brainstrust missed a trick in not including Morkel in the SA A side for the Zimbabwean and Australian fixtures, but that does mean that the stand-out bowlers from the last domestic season will get an opportunity to stake a claim for the Proteas squad.
At the top of that list is Hardus Viljoen of the Lions, who got a taste of Test cricket when he made his debut against England at the Wanderers in January. He didn’t have the best of times, taking 1/79 in 15 overs in the first innings as England wrapped up the series triumph with a convincing seven-wicket win.
But the strongly-built 27-year-old was still the leading wicket-taker in the Sunfoil Series with 47, and needs to take the next step on to the big stage by being dominant against Zimbabwe A and Australia A.
The second man on the Sunfoil Series list was Duanne Olivier from the Knights, who snuck on to the franchise scene without much fanfare last season, but took 41 wickets in four-day cricket.
The 24-year-old is tall and bowls at good pace, and is able to swing the ball away from the right-hander. Olivier was a consistent performer for the Knights last season and took his 41 scalps in just seven matches compared to Viljoen, who claimed his 47 wickets in nine games.
Apart from Philander, the other seamer who could put his hand up for higher honours is Lions all-rounder Dwaine Pretorius, who was outstanding with bat and ball in franchise cricket last season.
Pretorius was sixth on the leading wicket-takers’ list with 36, and scored 402 runs at an average of 30.92, with two hundreds and a fifty.
Proteas opener Stephen Cook will captain the SA A team that includes other Test players such as Dane Piedt, Stiaan van Zyl and Dane Vilas, while Titans star Heino Kuhn would also want to bat his way into the Proteas reckoning after being the leading run-scorer in the Sunfoil Series with 1 126, the only batsman to score over a thousand runs in the competition.
SA A Four-Day Squad
Stephen Cook (captain), Qaasim Adams, Theunis de Bruyn, Heino Kuhn, Sisanda Magala, Keshav Maharaj, Duanne Olivier, Andile Phehlukwayo, Vernon Philander, Dane Piedt, Dwaine Pretorius, Omphile Ramela, Stiaan van Zyl, Dane Vilas, Hardus Viljoen.
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