The upcoming World Test Championship final will mark quite a pivotal moment in the future of Test cricket for South Africa. With the increasing attraction of T20 franchise leagues across the world offering lucrative amounts, the red-ball format has become an afterthought outside the big three (India, England and Australia). South Africa, not long ago, at the beginning of the WTC cycle, sent their “provincial team” to New Zealand to accommodate the players who had SAT20 gigs.
Neil McKenzie, who played 58 Tests for South Africa in a nine-year career, spoke on whether he thinks Temba Bavuma’s men can beat defending champions Australia and what the WTC Final and Test cricket overall means to the country in a chat with The Indian Express.
Excerpts:
What does this WTC final mean to South Africa?
Everyone’s really excited in South Africa and can’t wait for the 11th of June. We’ve gone through a little bit of a slump in terms of Test cricket, in the last couple of years. So it’s nice to be back competing for the championship.
There have been a few questions raised on the path which South Africa has reached the final of the WTC final
It’s not South Africa’s fault or any of the other nation’s’ fault. That’s the scheduling. Yes, they haven’t played against Australia or England, but they’ve had some quality results. Winning in Bangladesh was quite clinical, especially having to sort of almost give up on the New Zealand (2023-24) tour because of the SA20.
There has been sharp criticism from former players about the way South Africa didn’t send their main team to New Zealand because of SA20. How do you view that?
We know what a big money spinner it is (SA20), and it’s really important for South African cricket. So you can have money to develop grassroots and your provinces, and have pipelines. So everyone understood it. It wasn’t ideal sending a second, third string to New Zealand. You don’t just want to hand out caps, and your test side has to be your ultimate side.
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We’ve seen some of the other countries where they’re playing a lot of young players in their Test side because of the T20 system and guys choosing to go that route, which is a personal choice for a lot of players. That team that went to New Zealand was all those guys who didn’t get a gig in the SA20 sides. So that’s taken out a lot of your core players. So it was probably a provincial team that went to play test cricket.
How do SA players view Test cricket with SA20 and all franchise money that can be made? We have seen Anrich Nortje deny a central contract
A guy like Andrew Nortje, he’s a fast bowler, bowling 150 km an hour. He knows his body. He’s not 21 anymore. So he’s got some choices to make in terms of what’s best for him. Obviously, we’d love to see him playing in the SA20 and Test cricket. But he’s had a couple of injuries. I never look down on anybody in terms of their decisions they make. Everyone’s got their reasons. But as an ex-player, I want South Africa to have at their call their best resources for test cricket.
We’ve got a few more all-rounders coming through the system, which gives our team a lot of balance in terms of Marco Jansen, Wian Mulder and some of those younger batters. If you look at how they’re coming through there, all of them have got Test 100s, and there’s competition for places, which hasn’t always been the case over the last couple of years. If you think of South African cricket and you think of all the wins in the history that we’ve had, there’s always been competition for places, and it’s hard to crack a position, where in the last couple of years, I don’t think that competition for places has been there.
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It could have been a bit of Kolpak (to play in County cricket in England), it could have been a couple of T20 leagues, but there’s that hunger now. A lot of those players are playing T20 as well. South African cricket is being clever in terms of allowing them to go earn their bucks, but managing players. So there’s a give and take. Players can’t just take, take, take in terms of, ‘I want to do this league, that league’.
What do you think of Temba Bavuma as captain, which makes him tick?
Temba’s been good. He’s found his little niche in terms of how he wants to captain. And there’s always that time where you’ve got to find your feet, know how you want to lead.
And he’s gone about it, not going away from his personality. He’s led in terms of the batting department the last couple of years, shown grit, gets stuck in, and been consistent in his performances. So that’s one way to lead.
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He has a quiet demeanour, but there’s a steeliness; your core skill has to be leading from the front, whether you’re a captain or not. So he’s been leading the batting department. And he’s making a good pair with Shukri Conrad as the coach. So they’ve got a World Cup final to show for their efforts and hopefully a win at the end of the Test match.
Australians are serial winners. What do you think South Africa will need, apart from obviously playing well, to beat this side?
It’s just doing the basics well, playing against a well-drilled experienced Aussie side that has been there before and done it. You don’t have to go there to try and do something different. South Africa got a blueprint of how they want to play.
You do the analysis on the opposition and try and find little chinks or little opportunities, which you can sort of get through to them. But South Africa should just focus on themselves, enjoy the occasion and sort of play as a team, which they’ve done. That character, that resilience, that pride playing for your country, that will come out just to fulfil your role.
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And with these tight Test matches there, you’ve got to stay in it. And if you are on top, you’ve got to try and stay on top, really push the hammer down because you know Australia, they’ve got an experienced bowling line-up and a few world-class batters – a few very X-factor batters. They’ll be bringing their toys to play. South Africa is going to match them, and they’ll have a lot of support at home and at the home of cricket, Lord’s.
