South Africa were as strong as ever in their recent Test series against India, recording an innings victory in the first match before losing the second. Developments since then, however, have put a question mark over the country’s future in Test cricket. South Africa announced a second-string team to be captained by an uncapped player for their upcoming two-Test series in New Zealand, with their first-choice stars all involved in the SA20 T20 league, while former captain Dean Elgar stated the lack of enough Test matches soon as the reason why he decided to retire from international cricket after the series against India.
South Africa pace legend Allan Donald says he is optimistic about SA20 having a positive impact on the side in all formats of the game and not just T20 cricket. He, in fact, stated that it is imperative that the league has a positive knock-on effect on red-ball cricket in the country. “For me, it is an absolute must. If we go back just three years where cricket in South Africa was, it was a dire state of affairs. What we saw last year with the birth of the SA20 and the hard work that Graeme Smith and his team have put in, the quality of overseas players and of young South Africans and the crowds that we see,” Donald told reporters in an interaction arranged by SA20.
“This is a huge step in the right direction for cricket in South Africa and where it should go in all formats. It is not just the white ball stuff, it is the red ball stuff as well. Having now come back into the South African first-class system, I am starting to see some big improvements,” he said.
‘Feel for the players going to New Zealand’
Neil Brand, who has played 51 first-class matches but never international cricket for South Africa in any format, will be their captain during the tour of New Zealand. Brand is one of six uncapped players in the side and Duanne Olivier, who has played 15 Tests, is the most experienced of the lot. Donald said that he feels for the players for the fact that they could be facing one of the best Test teams in the world in their home conditions with little prior experience in international cricket and for the fact that they didn’t get picked by SA20 teams. “I feel for those guys going to you know, they didn’t pick themselves. People say it’s a ‘B’ team. It’s a ‘C’ team, it doesn’t matter. They have to go to New Zealand and represent South Africa and I know that coach Shukri Conrad will do his utmost best to get them to get them rallied around playing good cricket.
“It’s got to be a clearer calendar where there’s nothing in the way that there’s no major Test series or other stuff that gets in the way. So I think we’ve had our first warning shot of what potentially could happen and it has happened that, that we are sending a team over there that is not our best Test team. But that’s for another day. And this is what we’ve got now and we’ve got the best some of the best players in the world competing here in SA20. So yeah, look, it’s I’m sure that the powers that be will sit down after this and make sure that planning for next year must be absolutely accurate,” Donald further said.
