For South African fans enjoying a feast of cricket, the arrival of the Aust= ral
ians is the cherry on top
CRICKET:Jon Swift
IT hardly seems credible that, in the midst of what seems a plethora of cri= cke
t, we have yet more coming our way – the Australians open their account wit= h t he gentle stroll in the park against the Nicky Oppenheimer XI at Randjesfon= tei
n next week.
In the light of the fact that next Wednesday is the date scheduled for the = fin
al of the current one-day international series – and the Oppenheimer match = col
lides with the spare day held over for the final in case of rain – it means= th
at tours are becoming very much of the seamless wall-to-wall variety.
It has placed an immense amount of pressure on the players. Not least of th= ese
pressures has been the continuous need to perform at peak level. Even in a=
pr
ofessional age, where the outside interferences of having to earn a living = in=20
a totally different arena have been eased by the players’ percentage of gat= e a nd TV money, this call for continued excellence is an impossibility.
All teams have their slumps, all players their drops in form. In this respe= ct,
it is well to examine the fortunes of Sachin Tendulkar and his Indian tour=
ist
s, and our own side under the steering of Hansie Cronje, before examining t= he=20
Australians and their current up-and-down form.
Tendulkar, like Mohammed Azharuddin before him, has suffered on a personal = lev
el, struggling to find the form with the bat that has marked him as one of = the
globe’s premier players.
The Indians have been hampered by a lack of depth in their bowling which ha= s p ermeated into virtually every other sphere of their play, and the current t= our
of South Africa is doubtless one they will be more than happy to relegate=
to
the misty realms of yesterday. For even though the emergence of Rahul Drav=
id=20
and Saurav Ganguly as players capable of walking the hot coals of a pitch s= ear
ed by the=20 pace of Allan Donald offers extra weight to the fact that the wristy player= s o f the sub-continent can play outside India, there remains the problem of in= doc
trination on home-grown wickets.
The days when an Indian new ball bowler’s main job was to turn his arm over= fo
r an over or two to take off the shine for the spinners has left us. The In= dia
ns cannot continue to over-bowl the likes of Javagal Srinath and Venkatesh = Pra
sad the way they have. Not when the same malaise of just too many overs bow= led
has taken the edge off as fine a player as Anil Kumble.
In this aspect, Tendulkar could do worse than look at how Zimbabwe’s skippe= r A listair Campbell has used his sometimes meagre resources. Exciting as Zimba= bwe
have been, they lack the real bowling depth so manifest in the wealth of S=
out
h African riches. Yet Campbell has used what he has sparingly and intellige= ntl
y.
One always has the feeling that, even when the game has started to run away= fr
om him, Campbell knows exactly what he is doing with the attack. He is a fi= ne=20
captain, despite his meagre years, and he has lived with both the superb fo= rm=20
of a veteran like Eddo Brandes and the wayward, nine-wides apprenticeship o= f E verton Matambanadzo.
Likewise, Cronje, coach Bob Woolmer and the South African selectors have ri= dde
n the waves of form and fortune. In this they have done a simply magnificen= t j ob. They have stuck with the classic classy talents of Andrew Hudson, witho= ut=20
much to show on the scoreboard in the one-dayers simply because he owns tha= t c lass and ability, before finally resting him.
It means that – until a spot in the final was all but secure – the frontrun= ner
s of our next generation of international players have sat it out. It has n= ot=20
been a bad thing in the analysis.
Paul Adams has had the breathing space he probably needs before the rigours= of
a three-Test series against the Aussies; Adam Bacher has doubtless learnt =
to=20
bridle an impatience he has to get back out there – an aspect which has sho= wn=20
in the ways he has managed to get himself out; and it has lit a veritable f= ire
in the heart of Jacques Kallis. Kallis has champed at the bit as the South=
Af
rican top=20 order has stuttered, and come back into the side steaming with both bat and= ba
ll to add yet another name to the list of growing all-rounders this country= ca
n call on.=20
A similar thing has occurred with the return of Jonty Rhodes, bringing with= hi
m the ebullience of old and the priceless ability he owns of being able to = cha
nge the tempo of a game so dramatically, be it by a sudden run-out or a whi= rlw
ind mini-innings, that re-arranges the patterns and thinking of the opposin= g a ttack so dramatically. Rhodes will always have his doubters as a five-day p= lay
er, but in the limited overs game, he remains an almost priceless asset.
The willingness of the national selectors to ride the storms has also allow= ed=20
Cronje to play himself back into devastating form and ease the extra burden= th
at captaincy has placed on him. Again this is cause for congratulation, eve= n i f there would be few Indian cheerleaders.
But most of all, the philosophy of staying with the players who have given = ser
vice and feeding the new blood in at a steady drip has allowed a smoothness= in
the process of transition that has helped rather than hindered the team.
Which leads inevitably to the state of the Australians. Their particular tr= ans
ition has been a stormy one since the uncompromising – and at times near br= uta
l -ideals of Allan Border.
Border has retired, so has David Boon – arguably one of the game’s greatest= sl
edgers – the glowering mustachioed menace of Merv Hughes is gone, as has th= e a ll-day power and pace of Craig McDermott. Of the newer faces, perhaps the m= ost
typical fatality is the elegant left-hander Michael Slater who made such a=
n i mpact on the last tour, although Ricky Ponting, Justin Langer and Matthew H= ayd
en can als o be counted among the casualties.
In an oblique way, captain Mark Taylor is also among the walking wounded, o= ff=20
form and under fire from the Australian critics, he faces the same Rubicon = Cro
nje has got a little over halfway across as a man expected to lead and perf= orm
all in the same fragile and often complicated human package.
Shane Warne, whose guiles turned Daryll Cullinan from a would-be lion into = a q uivering rabbit, has also not been without his problems and, while he remai= ns=20
one of the world’s premier bowlers, he has not found it as easy of late to = sen
d a side packing in total disarray.
No, it has not been as easy for the Australians in the past season or so as= th
ey have come to believe is almost their right on a diet of cowering post-Bo= tha
m Poms.
And yet, even with the humiliation of sitting out the final of a one-day ho= me=20
series, the Australians remain this country’s greatest rivals, the men we m= ost
want to beat. In this regard, it is well to remember that the Australians =
sti
ll managed to retain the Frank Worrell trophy in the ill-tempered series ag= ain
st the West Indians.
And perhaps even more importantly, there is nothing they hate worse than to= ta
ke a beating, a thought process that the more crass historians would have u= s b elieve stems directly from an aversion to the floggings on the convict ship= s.=20
Perhaps. It remains that the Aussies are redoubtable foes.=20
This may not be the team of hard-bitten veterans and burgeoning mirror imag= es=20
that arrived under Border, but there can be little doubt that they are here= fo
r a fight. One which begins this Thursday and one that could just see the d= ips
of form level out and make Cronje and his South Africans battle for every =
run
, each wicket and any victory that might be in the offing. It is a prospect= wo
rth weighi ng and savouring.
ENDS
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