Over the course of four ODI World Cups, he has been in and out of the South Africa side while plying his trade in leagues around the world and in county cricket

Firdose Moonda29-Aug-2023At 19 years of age, Wayne Parnell was the youngest cricketer to be nationally contracted in South Africa’s history. He was an all-round wunderkind and a left-armer to boot, and was described as an “asset for years to come” by the CSA CEO at the time, Gerald Majola.Parnell lit up the 2009 T20 World Cup with 4 for 13 against West Indies (including the wickets of Chris Gayle and Kieron Pollard) and finished as his team’s leading seamer at the tournament. South Africa were dumped out in the semi-final by eventual champions Pakistan but with an X-factor player like Parnell in their ranks, it did not look like it would be too long before they went all the way.Fourteen years later South Africa still don’t have a World Cup trophy but Parnell’s career has evolved through 135 international appearances either side of a Kolpak deal, several county stints, and spells in various T20 leagues. He is among the most experienced members of the South Africa side, a keen observer of his own, and others’, journeys through cricket, and a leader without a title – though he still can’t call himself a regular member of the starting XI.Related

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“I’m fairly satisfied,” Parnell said when asked to reflect on his career so far. “But the thing I would trade everything for would be to be part of a South African team that either wins an ICC event or even just plays in the final.”Lots of South African cricketers say this but very few have got as many chances as Parnell has. He is one of only five South African players whose career has spanned four ODI World Cups . He has also played in two Under-19 World Cups and four T20 World Cups.If selected for the upcoming ODI World Cup, Parnell will be the only member of the 2011 World Cup squad to play in 2023. That makes him part of a small club of two – current white-ball batting coach JP Duminy, who was also part of the 2011 World Cup squad is its only other member – who can speak to the differences in team culture between then and now.Before his senior international debut, Parnell led South Africa U-19s to the final of the World Cup in 2008, where they faced Virat Kohli’s India•Stanley Chou/AFP/Getty Images”If I look back, it was just that something was missing ,” Parnell said. “Maybe it wasn’t a proper squad. We just had a bunch of players. There was something lacking. Maybe certain players didn’t like other players . The dynamics were just off a little bit.”The environment has changed a lot over the course of my career. It’s so much better now, where players are interacting with each other and you can feel it’s more genuine. Maybe it’s just the way cricket has evolved.”Two years ago South Africa’s Social Justice and Nation-Building (SJN) hearings revealed some of the historic problems with national squads, even after readmission. There were tales of cliques and othering but Parnell also recalled a basic insecurity among players, who sounded desperate to hold on to their places . “It was like, ‘If I’m playing, then I can’t help this guy because he might take my spot and then I am out,'” he said. “Now players look at it like, ‘If I help Marco Jansen get better and he takes my spot, that’s good because it means he is better than I am and in that way he raises my level as well. And if I raise my level and he raises his level, then the whole team is better.'”If we have that mindset, we are helping the team. I’m not thinking that if I am bowling well and he is not bowling well, I am not going to help him because then I can make sure I get picked. If you have that mindset, you are never going to win a World Cup.”Parnell turned out for Durham in the T20 Blast in England earlier this year•NurPhoto/Getty ImagesWas that elbowing of other talent out of the way caused just by larger-than-life characters or was there an element of selfishness to it? “I don’t mind big personalities if they have the right attitude and if they care about the team environment as well,” Parnell said. “They have to have in their minds that it’s not just about them, it’s about us. Previously that was lacking. Because I am older, maybe I can see the bigger picture. It just seems there is a more genuine want for people to do well.”

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The search for improvement is never-ending for most sportspeople but in Parnell’s case it was more of an essential than a secondary goal. The main criticism he faced early in his career was that he was inconsistent. In a country that prizes fast bowling above all else, his quest for speed meant that he neglected other skills and it was only when he began playing more regularly in England that he started to explore what else he could offer.”I still have the ability to get up to 140 but what I’ve realised is that if it’s 140 or 135, it’s actually almost the same thing . If you ask batters, it’s more or less the same. Even guys who are bowling 150, the top-class batters play it as if it’s 125,” he said. “And playing in the UK, sometimes the wickets are really flat, so being able to bowl quickly is not enough.”So pace might be pace but it’s not everything. Parnell decided to try and rediscover his ability to swing the ball. “I had to figure it out for myself because it’s not something that is encouraged back home, where it’s more about hitting a certain length. You do, but if it’s going straight, you’re like a bowling machine,” he said.For a journeyman cricketer, especially on the T20 league circuit, the opportunity to work on skills of your own can be rare, but one such window presented itself last year for Parnell. He was part of Northern Superchargers’ Hundred squad but only joined them after South Africa’s series against England and Ireland, so he had a period where he was not contractually required to be part of either squad and used it to work on his game, training on his own.Parnell bats in his only innings as an ODI opener, in Auckland in 2012•Phil Walter/Getty Images”I would go to the outground in Leeds every day and spend half an hour or 45 minutes, bowling by myself, working out different things and trying to see with different grips on the ball, which one swings more. When you are in a team environment and you are training, it’s very competitive but to actually work on certain things, you have to go by yourself, when it’s quiet, when it’s a relaxed environment, and just play around.”Even back home, in Cape Town, I’ve done a lot of that over the last couple of years, where I go out on my own, put my AirPods in, put some music on and just bowl on my own and try and figure out what works well. Maybe with maturity, age, and having played a couple of seasons, I’ve become more self-aware. I lacked that previously. I think the best teacher is yourself. Someone else is teaching you from their perspective and what they’ve learnt but you are the one going through it. Everyone is different and I think that’s really worked for me.”

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By October 2017, Parnell had played 111 matches for South Africa, but still couldn’t really consider himself a regular and too often, played piecemeal parts in series. That may seem surprising considering the splash he made when he started, but he was unable to sustain it enough to consistently make it into a squad that always had access to good fast bowlers. As Parnell was coming up, so were Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel, and they formed the spine of the attack for much of the next decade. At the same time, South Africa were not quite settled on the type of allrounder they wanted – a lower-order hitter who was mostly a bowler, in the Lance Klusener mould; a top-order batter who could offer a few overs, as Jacques Kallis did until his retirement in 2014; or a spin-bowling allrounder lIke Roelof van der Merwe. Some would argue that they still aren’t quite sure. The team’s experimentation with options and combinations denied Parnell the opportunity to develop consistency at the highest level, which in turn led to him being too unpredictable when picked.Looking back, he also wondered if he could have done more with the bat to take ownership of a lower-middle-order place. “It was a combination of a lot of things but mostly we had a really strong team,” he said. “And it was such a tricky thing with the position I bat in. You either come in and there’s a couple of balls left or you come in and we are in trouble. I don’t think I understood how to get the balance right.”Parnell gets a hug from old mate Kohli during a match in his stint with Royal Challengers Bangalore in 2023. He took 3 for 10 against Rajasthan Royals in the game•Sajjad Hussain/AFP/Getty ImagesWith the change of regime in the 2017-18 summer, when Ottis Gibson succeeded Russell Domingo as head coach, Parnell was dropped from the national side. By that time he was married to Aisha Baker, a social-media influencer and entrepreneur, and they were starting to think of the next stage of their life and starting a family. The following year Parnell was part of the Worcestershire side that won the Vitality Blast, which included Moeen Ali, who he became friends with. The idea of moving to England semi-permanently came up around then.”It was sold really well to me by Moeen Ali,” Parnell remembered. “At the time, my wife was pregnant, and with international cricket and the uncertainty around tours, I knew if I did that, I would be in the UK for six or seven months of the year and then for the rest of it, I could come back to South Africa . It would be summer time, and I haven’t had a summer off since I was 17 or 18. It had nothing to do with CSA or the team. It was about wanting to get consistent playing time and going into an environment where I knew I could produce on the field and also help guys in and around the dressing room.”Parnell took a Kolpak deal, accepting that before he had even turned 30, he had ended his international career – albeit in expectation of a better quality of life. At the time, the UK had already voted to leave the European Union but the consequences of Brexit on Kolpak deals only hit two years later. The contracts were cancelled and any cricketers who stayed on in the county sides would revert to overseas-player status, thereby making them eligible to play for their countries again.In 2020, with the world in the grip of the Covid-19 pandemic and travel severely restricted, Parnell only played one match, in the Pakistan Super League. The following year, all ideas of a curated life with control over his schedule shattered, he signed with Northamptonshire. During this time there, his second child was born, whom he only met on his return to South Africa at the end of the season. “I’d also seen with the other players who start families not seeing their kids. I really wanted to be part of my children’s initial years but it worked out that the thing I tried to avoid is happening,” he said.Parnell bagged the big wickets of Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Strauss in the second innings in his debut Test, in Johannesburg in 2010, helping draw the series 1-1•PA Photos/Getty ImagesGiven that he no longer had the security of employment in England, Parnell had to take other opportunities that came his way, including one right on his doorstep. In September 2021, he was asked to captain Western Province in the CSA Provincial T20 Cup. They were knocked out in the first round but he was their leading wicket-taker and second highest run-scorer. Two months later he became the first high-profile Kolpak to be re-selected for South Africa, in a World Cup Super League series against Netherlands.”It was a bit of a surprise,” he admitted. “I had just come back and we had the T20 competition, but I did not think about the Proteas at all. I thought I was going to come back, enjoy playing at Western Province, and that it would be nice for my kids to see me playing professional cricket.”Parnell wasn’t the only one who wondered why he had been picked. Partly it might have been down to the upheavals of the pandemic and the fatigue being caused by biobubbles. South Africa’s T20 outfit had just returned from the World Cup in Abu Dhabi, and with an India series to follow, the selectors opted for something of a makeshift squad for the series they clearly believed they could win, and Parnell suspected as much. “I understand the dynamics of teams and squads but I also thought maybe they think I can still play at this level,” Parnell said. “I asked Victor [Mpitsang, the former convenor of selectors], ‘Is this just a once-off, where I play a couple of games because the big dogs are resting, or is there actually a way in?’ I was told to see it as an opportunity. I did not get a lot of clarity. I don’t know why we live in this grey space – it should be a simple yes or no. But I went into that series [which was postponed after one game thanks to the Omicron variant] and I’ve been part of the set-up since.”Last September, Parnell was the fourth-most expensive player at the SA20 auction, sold to Pretoria Capitals for 5.6 million rand (approx US$295,000). For someone from the Eastern Cape coast, who has made Cape Town his home, heading inland was its own culture shock.He was also asked to captain. “When the auction happened, Pretoria was last on the list in terms of thinking that’s where I am going to go,” he laughed. “And then just before the SA20 started, I got called and asked if I would be interested in captaining. I said yes because it was kind of like a no-brainer, but it was out of the blue.”Wearing the captain’s shoes before a Northern Superchargers game this year•Ashley Allen/ECB/Getty ImagesThough they had few standout names in their batting ranks – Phil Salt quickly became one – Capitals had a powerhouse bowling line-up that included Anrich Nortje, Josh Little and Adil Rashid. They finished top of the table at the end of the group stage and were losing finalists at the end of the first season.Parnell’s stocks as a leader grew. In a career move few would have predicted, he went on to captain Seattle Orcas in the inaugural MLC season, where they reached the final, and Northern Superchargers in the Hundred.Of late, he has developed a special affinity for strategy in league cricket. “T20 is such a cool format. It’s not just as simple as run up and bowl or hit the ball out of the park. There’s a lot involved, especially in setting up teams. It’s something I have really enjoyed,” he said. “In all the different leagues, you can have the best team but if you don’t gel well as a team, as a management group, as every single person involved, you are not going to win. What makes a successful franchise in every league is that they have really good local players and those are the guys that chip in and win you the competition.”In March this year Parnell was re-contracted by CSA, and a few weeks later, picked up an IPL deal with Royal Challengers Bangalore as a replacement for Reece Topley. He took 3 for 41 on his IPL comeback and played seven of the franchise’s 14 matches.Hit the decks: Parnell DJs at an event in Delhi during the 2011 World Cup•Lee Warren/Gallo Images/Getty Images”The last time I played in the IPL was in 2014, where you’d get a score of 200 every six or seven games,” he said. “Now, teams are scoring 200 almost every other game and you’re also seeing those scores being chased down. So batting-wise, the skill level has gone up. It’s as close to international cricket as you can get – more than any other league. It’s so tough and so fierce and the level of competition is very high.”Given the Benjamin Button-ing of his career, is the door still open for a Test comeback? “It’s not closed. You can still see through it,” he said. “But the goalposts have shifted. With the fifty-over World Cup and T20 World Cup next year, I felt like that’s a better possibility to win an ICC event but also, in terms of the longevity of my career. Physically it is a toll on the body.”And we’d do well to remember that Parnell is not 19 anymore. He has gone from a teenager to a father and now plays the game with fewer expectations and more maturity than before. He believes that has been the secret to his success so far. “It’s about understanding there is more to life than playing cricket.”As a younger player, playing for South Africa is the ultimate thing, or playing in the IPL is the ultimate thing. Playing in all these leagues is amazing. But when you have kids, it puts a different spin on life,” he said. “Cricket is a game. I still go out and try my best but when I’m done playing, no one is going to think of me. The game is going to move on. There are going to be other superstars coming through. As a player you are just part of the conveyor belt, but when you are on it, you have to enjoy it.”

The next two weeks could define the Sri Lanka captain’s growth trajectory in a role he has no option but to grow into

Shashank Kishore25-Oct-20232:42

Maharoof: ‘Hope Mendis the captain remains the same batter’

The earliest memory Kusal Mendis has of watching cricket is the 2003 men’s World Cup. As an eight-year-old, he had heard tales of the magic Aravinda de Silva weaved with the bat. Aravinda was well past his prime by then, but he had done enough to fuel Kusal’s burning desire to emulate him.A few months short of his 18th birthday, Kusal won the Schoolboy Cricketer of the Year award. The recognition that came along with it helped him meet his boyhood hero, who is believed to have told him he should aspire to be the captain one day.When Kusal burst onto the scene at the Under-19 World Cup in 2014, he was earmarked for big things including captaincy. It has taken nearly a decade for Kusal to get that job, but it has come under circumstances he wouldn’t have envisaged.Related

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As such, international cricket can be a hard place to learn on the fly and Kusal perhaps had valid reasons for not wanting the job in the lead-up to the 2023 World Cup. Far from a sustainer of good form, he had only slowly been emerging from that frustrating ‘one step forward, two steps back’ pattern that has been a constant in his seven-year international career.But amid an ordinary start to a campaign many were cautiously optimistic about, largely because of the conditions, Kusal has been thrust into the role. Dasun Shanaka, an admirable leader who had backers for his style of rallying a team in doldrums together, had been ruled out for the rest of the tournament with a quadriceps injury.As such, Shanaka’s batting had tailed off so alarmingly that even a late surge against South Africa in chase of 429 merely seemed to limit damage than offer hope of him returning to his ferocious ball-striking ways. That he was a reluctant bowler didn’t help.Kusal Mendis has the captaincy added to his batting and wicketkeeping duties•ICC via Getty ImagesSo, two losses in – the one against Pakistan deflating them, one where they failed to defend 345 – there were rumblings of a potential change. As it turned out, Shanaka’s injury may have saved the selectors from a tough call. It’s under this backdrop that Kusal led Sri Lanka for the first time last week, against Australia in Lucknow.It is an understatement to say he has had to hit the ground running. It is not quite a dreamy scenario. These are difficult circumstances that will need Kusal to not just manage his own form and expectations around his batting, but also figure out plans and work around all the other external challenges that come with the captaincy.His spontaneous response at his first press conference after captaincy on what he expects from the team was a giveaway of how quickly things have unfurled. “I hope the bowlers know their roles,” Kusal had said when asked about formulating specific plans. He wasn’t feigning ignorance. He had barely had a few days to settle into the job, forget about easing into a role or building a team with the players he’d seen or backed.It has been a week since that game. Sri Lanka have since gone on to scrap a win against Netherlands and find themselves in a logjam for points in the middle. On Thursday, they play England, who are equally desperate for two points. It is only bound to get tougher and Kusal knows there’s only so much wriggle room. If he wants, Kusal has plenty of sounding boards in the dressing room, like Dimuth Karunaratne or Angelo Mathews. But in the heat of the battle, he will have to be his own man.On Tuesday during Sri Lanka’s first training session in Bengaluru under lights, Kusal was largely by himself, focused on his own idiosyncrasies – like his shadow swing, playing an imaginative forward defence, ducking and weaving bouncers, playing a straight drive. In his own little bubble, or the ‘zone’ as they say, until he was tapped by the team manager.Then he walked across to observe proceedings from a little close, joining head coach Chris Silverwood to watch Mathews go through the motions. Mathews, of course, was Sri Lanka’s captain when Kusal debuted as a precociously talented batter in 2015. How the wheels had turned now. Here he was assessing Mathews from the eyes of a leader, not the boy-wonder who could barely mumble a few words to him.

“We all get into that cycle and then we come in, we go out and then the next generation comes in. So, playing under Kusal, where he started when I was the captain, it gives me pleasure because he’s come a long way and I’ve seen him grow as a person and also as a batsman over the years.”Angelo Mathews on playing under Kusal Mendis’ captaincy

That small moment encapsulated Kusal’s challenges. Of someone keen to work on himself in bringing out his best to now having to look beyond just his own goals for the team’s sake. There are five league games left, and each one a must-win for Sri Lanka. There are bowlers to manage, plans to formulate with coaches, senior players to hand-hold, handling media and the scrutiny that comes with the job.It helps that there’s warmth and mutual admiration among the leaders within the group. For someone as senior as Mathews to swallow his ego, and be part of the group as traveling reserve tells you of his keenness to contribute. For him to sit with Kusal and ease him into a role he is still getting used to – he’s captained at the Lanka Premier League, but not at any other level of senior cricket prior to this – must help.”He has evolved so much over the last five-six years,” Mathews said when asked about his assessment of Sri Lanka’s current captain. “And now he’s showing his maturity playing fearless cricket and leading from the front. And yes, I mean, playing under him, I’ve played under so many different captains and they’ve also played under me, so, it’s a cycle.”We all get into that cycle and then we come in, we go out and then the next generation comes in. So, playing under Kusal, where he started when I was the captain, it gives me pleasure because he’s come a long way and I’ve seen him grow as a person and also as a batsman over the years which is very fantastic to see.”There is striking simplicity to Kusal’s see-ball-hit-ball approach as a batter. Captaincy may not be so simple. But the key for Kusal will be in how he manages to channel his batting without allowing the rigours of the job to affect him. It’s easier to do so perhaps in a bilateral series. But with the stakes high, the next two weeks could define his growth trajectory in a role he has no option but to grow into on the toughest stage.

The No. 3 batter tried to hit half of the 16 balls he faced against Afghanistan to the boundary

Deivarayan Muthu14-Jan-2024The ball pings off the middle of the bat. Poof. It’s a rasping slog-sweep from outside off. Both the outfielders are on the leg side – deep midwicket and wide long-on – in the powerplay, but neither has a chance to cut it off.The slog – and it’s variety – is among the most productive shots for big-hitters in T20 cricket. But Virat Kohli, even at his destructive best, isn’t much of a slogger and relies more on timing the ball. Playing his first T20I in more than a year though, he was prepared to slog at a spinner in the powerplay.It wasn’t just spinner. Mujeeb Ur Rahman can turn the ball both ways and can even get the new ball to swing. He is in demand in T20 – and T10 – leagues around the world.Kohli has had his share of troubles against spin in T20 cricket and has been averse to taking risks against this variety of bowling in the past. But on Sunday, he tore up the old template and bristled with high intent. He hit 29 off 16 balls, with five fours. He tried to hit half of those 16 balls to the boundary, according to ESPNcricinfo’s logs. He took Mujeeb alone for 18 off seven balls at a strike rate of 257.14.Related

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In a middling chase of 173 against an Afghanistan attack that was without its leader Rashid Khan, Kohli could have opted to ease his way in. But he didn’t. Instead, he batted with purpose and looked entirely in sync with the way modern-day T20 cricket is played. Of course, the flat Indore pitch and the fast outfield helped Kohli, but the change in batting approach was clear. A plan is taking shape with the T20 World Cup, in the USA and the West Indies, less than six months away.Kohli even slogged Naveen-ul-Haq wide of long-on. He also dashed out of the crease to Fazalhaq Farooqi. He kept throwing his hands, hips, and shoulder at the ball despite the odd play-and-miss. He admonished himself when he missed. He also admonished himself when he failed to perfectly recreate six off Haris Rauf from the 2022 T20 World Cup in Melbourne. Just for the record, this ball that caused Kohli such grievance had almost sailed over the rope for six.Shivam Dube scored his second successive half-century•BCCIOnce again, there was precious little reason to be going so hard. This was a choice made by a high-class batter willing to adapt to the world around him. When Kohli tried to pump another boundary down the ground off Naveen, he ended up slicing it to mid-off. He then sat back in the dug-out and watched Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shivam Dube operate with similar high intent. Jaiswal struck at two runs a ball and Dube just under it as India made a mockery of the chase.India captain Rohit Sharma has also veered away from a safety-first T20 batting approach. After being run-out for a duck in the first T20I in Mohali, he could have taken his time to settle down in the second, but he chose to go hard from the get-go. He backed away and swung for the hills first ball, but Farooqi bowled full enough to trim the off bail.Perhaps having capable hitters like Axar Patel and Washington Sundar at Nos. 7 and 8 is giving India’s the top-order batters more freedom to attack. In the 2022 T20 World Cup semi-final, India had R Ashwin and Axar at Nos. 7 and 8. Ashwin has improved as a T20 batter, but he is more of a four-hitter than a six-hitter. When Hardik Pandya returns, he will lend even better balance.India will play just one more T20I, in Bengaluru on Wednesday, before the World Cup in June, but Rohit has already seen enough. He was very pleased with how his batters are refusing to take a backward step.”We are very clear with what we wanted to do and what we wanted to achieve as well,” he told the host broadcaster at the post-match presentation. “[There is a] very clear message to everyone in the team as well and when you see performances like that you can feel proud of it as well. It’s one thing to talk about it and it’s another thing to go out there and actually do it.”So, I’m happy we’re doing what we are speaking in our changing room and that’s a good positive for us, moving forward. In the last two games that we played, we’ve ticked almost every box, trying certain things in the powerplay, back end, and middle overs as well.”T20 moves at such a rapid pace that it can leave anyone behind. India, and more specifically Kohli and Rohit, know that better than most. Their last two World Cup campaigns were less than successful because they kept doing the same thing over and over again. Now there is a real desperation to do something different.

He’s taking over a team that has qualified for two IPL finals and won a title, and needs a big season to push for a place in India’s T20 World Cup XI

Shashank Kishore23-Mar-2024″I don’t know if you’ve looked at the captains photo with the trophy. That’s how different it is.”Shubman Gill summed up in one sentence the different vibe to IPL 2024. He was referring to the changing of the guard among captains. No Dhoni, Rohit or Kohli. Shreyas Iyer is the most experienced leader, while Gill is the newest.The new Gujarat Titans captain has barely any formal leadership experience. He’s led his state side Punjab in just two T20s in 2019-20. That’s two more than his predecessor – and opponent on Sunday, Hardik Pandya – had when he captained Titans to the IPL title in their first season in 2022, and steered them to the final again in 2023. The bar has been set high for Gill.Related

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He also takes over as Titans captain in what is going to be a crucial season for him as a batter. After a sensational performance in IPL 2023 – 890 runs – you’d imagine that Gill is a lock-in for India at the upcoming T20 World Cup. But the competition for place in the top order, and even to be a reserve in a 15-man squad, is tough.The spectacular rise of Yashasvi Jaiswal and the return of Rohit Sharma as captain leaves little room in the top two. Virat Kohli’s comeback to the shortest format means No. 3 could be spoken for too. Suryakumar Yadav, when fully fit, walks in as well.So this is the challenge facing Gill in his first season as Titans captain, just one year after he so successfully transformed himself as a T20 batter. Between 2019 and 2022, Gill had a best strike rate of 132 in an IPL season. He upped that to 157.80 while remaining prolific – three hundreds and nearly a fourth, an unbeaten 94.Gill took giant strides in improving his six-hitting too. Between IPL 2018 and 2022, he had hit only 47 sixes. Last season alone, he hit 33. The question now is whether Gill will continue batting this aggressively and effectively with the added responsibility of captaincy? There are some examples of young Indian batters who haven’t done so.A time for change: the next generation of IPL captains•BCCIRishabh Pant’s strike rate in his first IPL season as captain was 128.52; it was 152.26 in the previous three seasons. Sanju Samson’s strike rate was 147.32 for three seasons leading into his first as captain, when it dropped to 136.72. For KL Rahul, the drop was from 146.60 to 129.45.Hardik Pandya also slowed down as captain. He went from being a finisher for Mumbai Indians with a strike rate of 169 in three seasons before he became the Titans captain, and then scored at 131.26 in his new role as the team’s anchor. It’s probable that Gill isn’t aware of this trend, but he’s shown himself capable of overcoming challenges.As recently as February, his place in the Test side came under scrutiny during the home series against England after a string of low scores. As the criticism of his form and weakness against the incoming delivery grew, Gill displayed resilience in constructing a fighting second-innings hundred in Visakhapatnam. It paved the way for more runs in the next three Tests.IPL 2022 was an incredible season for Gill with the bat. He needs to find a way to match that along with the responsibility of captaincy, for the Titans to go far in the IPL, and to further his prospects of making the cut for the T20 World Cup.

At his core, he’s a getter-out of batters, and one of the greatest there has ever been – having every tool a spinner needs to take wickets anywhere in the world

Karthik Krishnaswamy05-Mar-20244:10

Ashwin at 100: Revisiting some underrated but legendary performances

Sometimes, the caption writes itself.Joe Root is out, lbw to a delicious, round-the-wicket offbreak from R Ashwin. The combined effect of the bowler’s angle, the ball’s drift from leg to off, and its turn in the opposite direction has made Root fall over to the off side and almost stumble to the floor in his failed attempt at a leg-side flick. He momentarily uses his bat to prop himself up, and your eyes pause on the sticker.New Balance.Sometimes, the caption writes itself, and this one worked on at least three levels. It could have been a comment on what that ball did to Root, or on the state of the match: England had begun the day in control of the Ranchi Test, and India were now all over them. Or it could have announced, in a nod to more than one Tamil blockbuster, that the hero, having spent the first half of the film taking blow after blow without retaliating, had now taken a firm, vein-popping grip of his machete.Related

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Before this innings, Ashwin had taken 12 wickets in this India-England series at an average of 38.83. He had ended only one of his 19 previous home series with a worse average, and only two of them with a 30-plus average.If you had been watching him bowl, you would have struggled to identify any real reason for his unusually slim returns. These things happen sometimes, especially over samples as small as three-and-a-half Test matches, but in the context of series, against opposition, playing brand of cricket, and at stage in Ashwin’s career, it seemed to mean something. It put an uneasy feeling in his fans’ stomachs.They need not have worried. Or perhaps saying that is just another way of taking Ashwin for granted. The man is a five-for machine – he picked up his 35th in Ranchi, drawing level with Anil Kumble while having bowled in 49 fewer innings – but each of them has needed him to find a way to get on top of a different line-up in a different situation on a different surface.In Ranchi, he bowled with the match in the balance, with the series potentially at an inflection point, on an unusual sort of pitch that made him attempt an unusual style of bowling. A style for which, as he later put it, he had to “literally rewire” himself.Watch the Root wicket again and it’s evident that Ashwin bowled this ball with pure sidespin, the seam rotating clockwise from point to square leg. He had employed this square-seam release right through this spell, maximising drift and using the new-ball lacquer to try and get natural variation off the surface. The complete reliance on sidespin at the expense of overspin was perhaps also a reason why he overpitched on more than one occasion: he wasn’t even trying to get the ball to dip on the batter, so the margin for error when he tried to go full was minimal.In a way, the half-volleys Ashwin bowled, which Zak Crawley used his reach to punish in particularly ruthless manner, elevated his spell. They shone a light on the difficulty of this craft that Ashwin has spent much of his career making look simple, and its jeopardy: get it slightly wrong, and it becomes the easiest thing to punish.Ashwin has the best strike rate of any spinner with at least 150 Test wickets•ICC via Getty ImagesMore often than not, though, Ashwin got it just right. He took the wickets of Ben Duckett and Ollie Pope off successive balls that drifted significantly – into the left-hander, away from the right-hander – and turned very little, if at all. Duckett, like a number of other batters in this Test, propped forward with the threat of low bounce seemingly on his mind, and popped an inside edge to short leg.Then Pope, a victim of more than one Ashwin special in the past, was beaten all ends up by another: trapped in the crease, playing across the line, squared up, lbw.The Pope ball also revealed another thing that differentiates Ashwin from most fingerspinners. Very few umpires would have given this lbw in pre-DRS times, but Ashwin belongs to his time, and does everything he can to maximise its returns. He bowled this ball from so close to the stumps that he was almost in front of the umpire when he released it, so that it was still on course to hit leg stump even though it pitched somewhere between middle and leg, and hadn’t really straightened against its initial angle.The stumps are bigger in the era of DRS, and Ashwin’s mastery of angles and drift allows him to keep them in play more of the time, and in more devious ways, than pretty much anyone else.

It’s not new for Ashwin’s artistry to get lost in the fog of random noise. It’s the world he inhabits

The Root ball was another example of this. When it left Ashwin’s hand, Root may have thought it was on course to pitch outside leg stump, but when it landed it was exactly in line. The magic of drift. Ashwin’s only first-innings wicket had come off a similar ball, a ball that must have given Jonny Bairstow the illusion that it was safe to sweep, only to drift and land in line with leg stump rather than outside.Just in line, but still very much in line.The great spin bowlers frequently occupy these liminal zones, with the barest of divisions between the ball as it appears and the ball as it actually is.These balls tend to cause as much confusion off the field as they do in the batter’s mind. One predictable outcome of the Root dismissal was the fanning of a DRS non-controversy by a former cricketer who ought to have known much, much better, and its amplification all over traditional and social media.It’s not new for Ashwin’s artistry to get lost in the fog of random noise. It’s the world he inhabits.In the days since his Ranchi masterclass, he will also have noted, with a wry smile, the scorecard from the Wellington Test match, and the numbers in the wickets columns of Nathan Lyon and Glenn Phillips. Over the last few years, Ashwin has also seen Keshav Maharaj, Jack Leach, Neil Brand and Dane Piedt take bagfuls of wickets in New Zealand. When India have gone to New Zealand, however, or to South Africa or most venues in England, they have invariably come face to face with greentops designed to neutralise their spinners. The lack of a five-wicket haul outside Asia and the West Indies is viewed as a gaping hole in Ashwin’s CV, but in denying him a real chance to fix it, India’s oppositions have paid him perhaps their greatest tribute.It has been noted before on these pages and elsewhere, but it’s worth repeating: of all spinners who have bowled in at least ten innings in Australia, England, New Zealand and South Africa since the start of 2018, Ashwin (30.57) has the second-best average behind Nathan Lyon (28.41).Ashwin recently picked up his 500th Test wicket•Getty ImagesAshwin has every tool a spinner needs, and then some, to take wickets anywhere in the world. He just happens to play in an era where India have another world-class spinner who happens to be the world’s best allrounder, and where India can pack their side with four fast bowlers if the conditions call for it.None of these arguments will ever quieten the chorus that Ashwin is a home-track bully, and the insinuation that the home tracks Ashwin has played on have been a homogenous succession of square turners. No amount of painstaking reasoning can fight that chorus, and Ashwin has probably made peace with that fact.But here are some other facts. Better average than Shane Warne. Best strike rate of any spinner with at least 150 Test wickets. More wickets and five-fors in India wins than anyone else. You probably know all these things already, but you probably don’t realise how astonishing they are just yet.And that is a good thing. If we are still waiting for that realisation to dawn, it means Ashwin is still there at the top of his mark, muttering to himself as he twists the ball into his palm, still making you guess which load-up he will choose today, still engaging in pedantic debates with umpires, still racking his brain for new ways to get batters out.At his core, that’s what Ashwin is: a getter-out of batters. One of the greatest there has ever been. He has brought up two hugely significant milestones during this series, and perhaps nothing sums him up like the order in which they’ve come: the 500th wicket before the 100th Test. Do the math, and marvel.

And what is the lowest score successfully defended in a T20I?

Steven Lynch18-Jun-2024What’s the lowest score successfully defended in an uninterrupted T20 match? asked Brian Matthews from England
The lowest total that was enough to win a seniormen’s T20 game in which both sides had the full 20 overs at their disposal is 78, by Himachal Pradesh in a Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy match in Rohtak in India in 2013: they then bowled Services out for 77 to win by one run. The previous record was set in the same competition in 2010 in Vadodara, Maharashtra were bowled out for 81, but then skittled a Saurashtra side including Cheteshwar Pujara, who had just made his Test debut, for 67.The men’s T20 international record was set in Lagos in October 2021: Nigeria made only 90, but skittled Sierra Leone for 71. In Kingston in February 2014, West Indies managed only 96 for 9 in their 20 overs, but restricted Ireland to 85 for eight.When India (119) restricted Pakistan (113 for 7) to win in New York last week, they equalled the record for the lowest total successfully defended in the T20 World Cup, set by Sri Lanka (119) when they defeated New Zealand (60) in Chattogram in March 2014. But a new record was set the day after India’s exciting win, also at Nassau County in New York, when South Africa (113 for 6) beat Bangladesh (109 for 7).Namibia’s David Wiese both batted and bowled in the Super Over after their T20 World Cup tie against Oman. Has this happened before? asked Matthew Behan from England
Namibia’s 39-year-old allrounder David Wiese scored 13 of his side’s 21 runs in the Super Over after their T20 World Cup match against Oman in Bridgetown on June 2 was tied at 109 apiece. He then returned to the bowling crease, ensuring victory by conceding only four runs from the first five balls, before the last delivery went for six.I couldn’t instantly remember any similar occurrences, but actually there have been three, one of them in an earlier T20 World Cup: in Pallekele in October 2012, West Indies’ Marlon Samuels conceded 17 runs from the Super Over against New Zealand, but then helped Chris Gayle collect the winning runs.The other instances were by Shahid Afridi for Pakistan against England in Sharjah in November 2015, and Singapore’s captain Janak Prakash against Bahrain in Bangi (Malaysia) in December 2022.There’s also one case in an ODI: in Harare in 2023, Logan van Beek of the Netherlands smashed 30 off Jason Holder in the super over, then grabbed the ball and took two for eight.England reached their target against Oman the other day in 3.1 overs. Was this the quickest victory in a T20I? asked David Northall from England
England overhauled Oman’s modest total of 47 in Antigua the other day in just 3.1 overs, helped when Phil Salt smashed the first two deliveries of their innings for six (he was then out, for 12 in three balls).This was the quickest victory by a Test-playing nation in a T20I, beating the five overs it took Sri Lanka to overhaul the Netherlands’ total of 39 in the World Cup in Chattogram in March 2014. Bangladesh also reached their target in five overs against Pakistan in the bronze-medal match at the Asian Games in Hangzhou (China) last October , but that had been reduced by rain to a five-over match.There have been nine quicker wins by non-Test nations in T20I, including one by Oman (in 2.5 overs against the Philippines in Al Amerat in February 2022). The quickest of all came in Cartagena in February 2023: after bowling the Isle of Man out for 10 (with six ducks), Spain reached their target in just two legal deliveries. After George Burrows started with a no-ball, Awais Ahmed hit the next two for six.England chased down the target of 47 against Oman in 19 balls, the quickest victory by a Test-playing nation in T20Is•Getty ImagesI believe Sunil Gavaskar scored the most Test runs as an opener. Does he also have the highest average when opening? asked Milind Chandrasekharan from India
Sunil Gavaskar did hold the record for most Test runs by an opener for many years, but he was eventually overtaken by England’s Alastair Cook, who passed Gavaskar’s 9607 runs in July 2016, and finished with 11,845 from the top of the order. The South African Graeme Smith is third with 9030.Gavaskar averaged 50.40 when opening, a remarkable effort considering how much of his career was against the fearsome West Indian pacemen of the time. Of batters who opened at least 20 times in Tests, only 16 have averaged 50 or more. That includes current players in Usman Khawaja (54.03) and Rohit Sharma (50.03).Highest of all – and the only man who averaged more than 57 when opening – is England’s Herbert Sutcliffe, who averaged 61.10 while scoring 4522 runs as an opener in 54 Tests between 1924 and 1935.Next comes the South African Bruce Mitchell with 56.90, just ahead of two famous Englishmen in Len Hutton (56.47) and Jack Hobbs (56.37).Further to the recent question about bowlers taking the first nine wickets in a Test innings, there was another near miss in Pakistan in 2000, when Saqlain Mushtaq took the first eight wickets to fall, only to be denied a shot at all ten by a declaration. Are there any other cases like this? asked R Jayanth from India
The match you’re talking about was the first Test of England’s 2000-01 tour of Pakistan, which ended with a famous victory in the twilight in the third Test in Karachi. But a few weeks earlier, in Lahore, England had ground their way to 480 for 8, with offspinner Saqlain Mushtaq taking all eight wickets to fall (he finished with figures of 74-20-164-8). Wasim Akram and Mushtaq Ahmed were among his wicketless colleagues. I don’t think it was a case of England’s captain Nasser Hussain declaring to deny Saqlain a shot at glory: he closed the innings at lunch on the third day, after 800 minutes and 196 overs (Bazball it was not).There are no other instances of a bowler taking the only eight wickets to fall in a Test innings, or even all seven. When New Zealand made 200 for 6 against South Africa in Wellington in 2011-12, the tall fast bowler Morne Morkel finished with 6 for 23.Shiva Jayaraman of ESPNcricinfo’s stats team helped with some of the above answers.Use our feedback form, or the Ask Steven Facebook page to ask your stats and trivia questions

Since the 2022 CPL, Hope has steadily upped his scoring rate, and when presented an opportunity in the powerplay, he capitalised to produce one of his best innings

Sidharth Monga22-Jun-20244:53

Ganga: Hope is now a T20 player and can play different roles

“Who doesn’t like to play shots, man?”

Even in a good mood, Shai Hope is not quite impressed with questions about his strike-rate. Perhaps the questions are due because this was only his fourth innings in 111 T20 games that went at better than two a ball and lasted for at least 15 balls. Perhaps Hope is justified in being a little prickly about it because three of those four have come in the last year alone. Since the start of the 2022 CPL, Hope has gone at a strike-rate of 137.77, which is a big improvement from 117.24 before that.Hope smashed 82 off 39 against USA. Looking effortless while doing so, his innings also helped West Indies go past the net run-rate of other teams in their group, leaving them a more straight-forward task of just beating South Africa in their final Super Eight match rather than keeping an eye on the run-rate too.Related

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At the press conference that followed, Hope took an exception to this being called an innings out of character when asked if this was the best he had batted in a T20 game.”I would like to throw that question back at you,” Hope said without ever getting around to whether this was indeed the best he had batted. “Why is it out of character in your eyes?”It is understandable that he doesn’t like not getting due credit for turning his game around. Especially when you consider he is going at 147.35 this year even though it has probably meant he has scored only one half-century. His numbers are all the more impressive because he plays a lot in the CPL, which tends to be lower-scoring. His strike-rate is about the same as the overall strike-rate in the matches he has played in the last two years.While these are all signs of an improved game, and perhaps a better understanding of the format, Hope said it has always been about batting according to the situation.”To be honest, it’s just the situation, man,” Hope said. “It’s whatever is required. There’s some games where the conditions may be challenging and you have to fight. You can’t just go out there and try to smash every ball for six or four. Someone has to stick in and play along. I don’t think people realise that.”We understood what’s at stake here. We know that in this situation run-rate could play a part. So, 105 strike-rate wasn’t going to be the play today. So again, just playing the situation. That’s the one thing that I pride myself on as a batsman, as a cricketer.”Hope also said they hadn’t calculated exactly how soon they needed to finish the job to go past South Africa on net run-rate. It was just about being mindful of finishing early while letting the natural instincts take over.”Not entirely,” Hope said when asked if they hadn’t made the calculations even at the start of the chase, which – for what it’s worth – was 14.4 overs. They finished much quicker in the end. “We didn’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves because sometimes that can play on the negative side.”So yes, we understood the importance of getting the game finished quickly, but we didn’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves. The aim was to play the powerplay as normal as we could, put away the bad balls, put the guys on the pressure at the start of the over, stuff like that, and then we assess after the powerplay and then decided that we wanted to finish by a certain stage.”We might never get to know whether Hope would even have played had Kyle Mayers, the replacement for the injured opener Brandon King, been available for selection. For the only match Hope has played so far this World Cup was at No. 4 in what was a dead rubber for them. He was tried as a replacement for Roston Chase, the one designated batter in the side to play the role of the anchor should the need arise.It is possible that, entirely by accident, Hope got this one chance in a role that suits him much more than the middle order, and he displayed all his improvements. No. 3 is where he flourished in the last CPL. Getting to start in the powerplay is perhaps the ideal role for him. West Indies earlier didn’t have a vacancy there, and now he has made an irresistible case for himself when he got that one chance.Bigger opponents await, but Hope has form on his side. He might have a big part in making sure his next chance – which looks like the next game – is not West Indies’ last in a home World Cup.

He stamped his aura on the last day of the English Test season, putting the seal on a famous Sri Lanka win

Vithushan Ehantharajah09-Sep-2024Pathum Nissanka’s celebration for his second Test century was familiar but still as crisp as ever.Helmet in one hand, bat in the other, arms outstretched, and hair on point. Still for a moment, milking the ovation from the near-10000 here on Monday at the Kia Oval. A facsimile Jude Bellingham stance, albeit a good foot shorter, but with just as much aura. It said all that needed to be said; “you came for the last day of the English Test season, but you’ll leave thinking of me”.There were not many better candidates for Sri Lanka’s hero in this third Test. The neatness to Sri Lanka registering a first win at the Kia Oval since 1998, thanks to a man born earlier that year. Likewise, that a fourth Test win on these shores was steered home by someone skipper Dhananjaya de Silva was happy to label “the best batsman in Sri Lanka right now” during the post-match presentations. He will join the likes of Don Bradman and Gordon Greenidge as the seventh overseas batter to strike a fourth-innings hundred in a winning cause.The overnight split of Nissanka’s unbeaten 127 – 53 off 44 on Sunday evening, 74 off 80 the next morning – speaks to its pro-activeness. Sharp out the gates, calmness throughout, particularly in Autumnal conditions for part two – then a kick over the finish line with a flurry of boundaries.Related

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The instructions at the start of the pursuit of 219 were simply to play with freedom. “What I told him was that even in 50 balls, he scores 150, I’m happy with that,” revealed Sanath Jayasuriya. “What we need is runs.” Runs are what they got, though perhaps not quite at the lick their interim coach suggested to the hero of the piece.England still took the series, of course. But there was a sting to how easily they were dispatched by such measured yet attacking verve. Nissanka did unto them as they strive to do to others.But don’t get it twisted. Nissanka wasn’t simply the best version of England, he was the best version of himself. And that is no accident, nor is it simply a story about steady technical progression, but rather steady growth.The 30 months between centuries number one on debut and this one in his 11th cap speak for themselves, as do the contrasts. Against West Indies in March 2021, he spent 19 minutes shy of six hours at the crease, eventually finishing with 103 from 252 balls. He ends this match with 191 off a total of 175, and the unique honour of being the ninth batter in Test history to pass fifty in fewer than fifty balls in both innings.And yet, both are true reflections of Nissanka. That arrival on the Test scene was predicated by an average of 65 in Sri Lanka’s first-class system, which didn’t just set him apart from the rest, but had beards trying to discern whether he was a phenomenon or just an anomaly. Given the country’s batting production line had slowed to a chug, there was a temptation to settle on the latter.Angelo Mathews and Pathum Nissanka celebrate Sri Lanka’s famous win•Getty ImagesMickey Arthur, Sri Lanka coach at the time, knew they had a good one, but could also see how this “different beast”, as he put it, needed to be honed rather than tamed. “I guess mentally we had to give him assurances that this is where we wanted him to play. This is what we wanted him to do. And irrespective of whether he was a success, we still backed him.”Things did not necessarily play out that way, even if Nissanka did have a solid enough average of 38.35 from his first nine caps, before a two-year hiatus. That was essentially the result of a back injury that initially sidelined him, before a long-term hamstring niggle that ended up ring-fencing him for limited-overs cricket.White ball cricket, however, did not come all that easy until 2022, when he seemingly got bitten by a radioactive Sanath. The assumption of a new penchant for risk – rooted in hardwired knack for picking up length – came alongside a greater selection of shots to choose them. And the six one-day centuries that followed, including becoming the first Sri Lanka batter to strike an ODI double-hundred at the start of this year, ingrained a new natural game in Nissanka that has finally made it to the Test stage.Across the four innings he has played on this tour, his 26 fours are more than half what he managed in the previous 15. The Olly Stone bouncers he sent into the stands at backward square leg on Sunday have now trebled his overall tally of Test sixes.

“A facsimile Jude Bellingham stance, albeit a good foot shorter, but with just as much aura. It said all that needed to be said; “you came for the last day of the English Test season, but you’ll leave thinking of me””

As Nissanka blocked everything worth blocking, while still managing to guide boundaries whether driving or leaping off his toes to cut through point, before finally opening his wrists into a drive in that region to confirm victory, it seemed crazy he missed that first Test. The reasons for that were nothing more than loyalty to Nishan Madushka as the man in possession of the openers’ spot.”Pathum came in after a long time with his injury,” Jayasuriya explained. “And also Nishan Madushka and Dimuth (Karunaratne) – these were the guys we were playing with for almost a year, without Pathum. We wanted to give him (Madushka, eventually dropped for the third Test) the chance to play well.”The sense is that Dhananjaya wanted Nissanka in for the start. If there’s any consolation, Sri Lanka’s captain won’t be starting a series without him any time soon.There will be some inevitable patronising of Sri Lanka with this result. That it is good for the game and the wider health of Test cricket. Perhaps there is some truth to that. But at the same time, this Test veered into uninspiring patches largely because of England’s approach.Thankfully, though, Nissanka provided a classy ending – of a talent embarking on a grand new beginning.

Having burst onto the scene as a teenager, England allrounder is a fixture on the international and franchise circuits

S Sudarshanan27-Sep-2024Alice Capsey’s words sometimes belie her years. “You are always going to fail more than you succeed,” she says about the vagaries of our sport, channelling the wisdom of a seasoned cricketer. But as she holds the phone still, maintaining a perfect frame without a tripod or a stand throughout our 20-minute chat, it gives a glimpse of just how young she is – only 20 years old. She is also good at this other thing – hitting the cricket ball real hard. And that has kept her quite busy in the last few years.Capsey made her international debut in July 2022 just ahead of the inaugural women’s cricket competition at the Commonwealth Games. Since then, she has played a staggering 104 T20s since her debut – in Australia, India, New Zealand and South Africa, apart from England – and has managed to adapt and leave a mark everywhere.In just her third year at the international level, she is set to feature in her second T20 World Cup, her ability to assess conditions quickly making her an important member of England’s touring party.Related

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“At the moment, the game’s evolving so quickly that you have to think where you are at within the women’s game but also where your game is at in general,” Capsey told ESPNcricinfo ahead of England’s departure to the UAE for a training camp. “It is no longer just a summer sport. You look at the next six months and there are various different tournaments.”International cricket is jam-packed now, which is really exciting. Having to be aware of where your game is at so that you stay in the mix and stay on top of your game. I have learnt to manage my game and I am always looking to learn.”I have only just turned 20, so I am pretty young, and have loads of work to do in my game. I am sure technically it’ll evolve over the next couple of years, but also a bit more tactically – all those things, you learn so much from playing international cricket and playing around the world.”Capsey’s initial period at the highest level has also coincided with the rise in T20 cricket leagues on the women’s circuit. She played in the inaugural editions of the Women’s Hundred and the Women’s Premier League, as well as in the Women’s Big Bash League. She’s stamped her mark in most of them, batting in the top order as well as picking up crucial wickets with her offspin. The lessons on countering various conditions and situations have been immense.Alice Capsey is a regular on the global franchise circuit•ECB via Getty Images”Just the amount of cricket I have played in different environments I have been in, you pick up so much by playing alongside different people,” she said. “We have got a number of world-class cricketers in this England environment; you don’t get much better than someone like Nat [Sciver-Brunt], who’s such a level head and has played for so many years now, is so experienced and knows the game so well. So, for younger players to be in the changing room with her year-in year-out, you learn so much around how she trains, how she thinks about it.”I have been lucky that the overseas players we have had at the Hundred [with Oval Invincibles], I have learnt so much from my first two years under Dane [van Niekerk]. I thought she and Marizanne Kapp were really influential in the way I go around with my batting. Just the backing I got from them gave me so much confidence.”The WPL and WBBL have been such amazing experiences, I have absolutely loved it. You always learn more from the natural conversations than you do from the necessarily forced conversations, where you are literally asking the questions. My game’s naturally evolving and that comes down to the environments I have been a part of and how the players I have been in changing rooms with have been so open about how they go about things.”I feel lucky with how I have timed it almost; it’s been like one thing after the other and over three years, I have had a different first each year to keep it new and exciting. As a player it drives you so much to get better and it’s amazing.”

“We’re in that generation of cricketers that have got a bit of fear of missing out.”Jonathan Finch, director of England women’s cricket

Being busy comes with its own challenges, though. Globe-trotting from international games to T20 leagues took its toll on Capsey and, as a result, she opted not to play regional cricket this season. She returned rejuvenated and scored her first T20I half-century since August 2023.Professionalism is still relatively new in the women’s game and so the effects are only starting to be felt. There is an array of options for youngsters like Capsey, and the need for taking a step back gets lost at times. This is where international scheduling becomes critical for a cricket board and the importance of communicating where a player stands in the scheme of things has never been higher.Jonathan Finch, director of England women’s cricket, put it this way: “You don’t do it as a one-size-fits-all and that’s where sometimes we get a little bit of criticism: ‘Why are you letting that player do that and why are you letting player do that?'”If you’ve got an 18-year-old player that suddenly hasn’t been exposed to multiple franchise competitions in a 12-month-of-the-year programme, their understanding of what that is is far less to a Heather Knight who’s been able to do that, manage themselves physically and all that kind of stuff. So, there’s an element of giving them a little bit rope to do it, failing a little bit and then coming back.”So, a Big Bash experience might be a massive development opportunity for a [young] player, whereas for someone at the back end of the career, it’s less so. Then you sit down and you have those discussions and there’s so many different things that go into that, whether that’s physical, mental, emotional, the actual cricket side of things.”We’re in that generation of cricketers that have got a bit of fear of missing out [FOMO] because a lot of new things are coming up and there’s a sensation or a feeling that ‘well if I don’t do that now I won’t get that opportunity moving forward’. The challenge for us is sometimes giving players the confidence that looking at things over the 12-, 24-, 36-month period, you can calm down a little bit and you can plan that.”But that’s probably our biggest challenge – managing individual players’ and staff programmes considering now there are ICC tournaments every year, the Women’s Championship, the next FTP, putting in your kind of big-ticket tours like Australia and India and all those types of things.”Alice Capsey celebrates a wicket•BCCIA message from her agent that read: “Renegades with a ‘tick mark’ emoji” on an early September morning confirmed Capsey’s busy time will continue after the T20 World Cup. A week after the final, WBBL 2024-25 starts with Capsey picked by Melbourne Renegades in the draft.”It happened very early, so I didn’t see where I was going until I woke up in the morning, which was a nice surprise and then had a couple of messages from the Renegades head coach and general manager,” said Capsey, who played for Melbourne Stars in the last two editions. “With my availability and so many amazing players in the draft, I was really hoping to get picked up.”I have played under Jonathan Batty [head coach at Stars, Oval Invincibles and Delhi Capitals] in all three franchises in the last three years and he’s had a big influence on my career and we have got an amazing relationship. To now be able to go and play for Renegades and just to play with new people, be in a new environment under a new coaching staff adds a bit of freshness. I’d be jumping at it to go in a new environment and just carry on learning. It’s a great opportunity for me and I am looking forward to it.”I know some of the girls there already, so there will be a few familiar faces and that will be nice. But I have been at Stars for the last two years and have so much to thank them for, for the support they had for me and the relationship I have built with Stars; I have some of my best friends there. The people I have met have been amazing and they have been such a big influence in my career.”Alice Capsey and England are keen to adapt to UAE conditions quickly•Getty ImagesOne of the immediate challenges for Capsey will be to assess and adapt to conditions in UAE. England’s training camp would have given her a chance to get used to the surfaces and the heat. And then there are a couple of warm-up matches against Australia and New Zealand. But how does she really prepare and get used to new conditions?”It is just about embracing the new challenge and asking lots of questions, that’s the key for me,” Capsey said. “It is about a few conversations and then getting the feel from a few nets. It is pretty natural, you pick things up pretty quickly.”At the end of the day, the conditions change how you play, somehow you work out what shots work the best on that pitch. But you are not going too far away from what shots you play naturally. You still want to play your way and you don’t want to stray too far away from what’s given you success so far. From that point of view, it’s about tinkering with your game and having those knowledgeable conversations with players or staff and getting a really good understanding.”We have a pretty good understanding of how hot it is going to be and we know we are going to be physically challenged in other manners to, say, how we play in England. We all will be preparing the best we can, and so when we get out there, it won’t be too much of a shock. You don’t know what’s going to be thrown at you, so staying as relaxed as possible is a good thing for me. Trying to take each day as it comes and see what’s in front of you.”

They hadn’t conquered Asia since 2014, and following their series win in Bangladesh, South Africa are setting sights on higher honours

Firdose Moonda31-Oct-2024It still matters. Winning away from home matters. Winning in the subcontinent matters. Doing both those things as a country that is now seen as one of the Test nations matters most of all, as South Africa have just experienced.Don’t buy into the talk that it’s only Bangladesh, a place where South Africa have never lost a Test and look at the bigger picture. For the last ten years, the subcontinent has been all but insurmountable. Between September 2014 and September 2024, Australia, England, New Zealand, South Africa and West Indies collectively played 35 series in the subcontinent and won just six. Of those, England were responsible for three series (Sri Lanka 2018 and 2021 and Pakistan in 2022) while South Africa lost all four series they played.To be able to finally change that is something South Africa’s stand-in captain Aiden Markram described in an understated way as “very special,” while also recognising the significance it has in serving as a marker of progress.”For us as a group of players, we’ve never won a game or a series in the subcontinent so that makes it very special. It’s been a tough journey at times and to slowly be progressing is a really good thing for us,” he said.Related

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The last time South Africa conquered Asia was in 2014, at the latter end of a dream run that saw them go nine years unbeaten on the road. At the time, Markram was fresh off captaining the under-19 side to the age-group title in the UAE and the future looked bright. They didn’t know it then, but things were already changing.Big-name retirements started with Jacques Kallis in 2013 and every year since then someone else who was considered essential to success stepped away. As recently as last December, former captain and stalwart opener Dean Elgar called it a day which means South Africa have been in transition for almost ten years. The subcontinent became an impossible place to win as South Africa experienced in India in 2015 and 2019, in Sri Lanka in 2018 and in Pakistan in 2021. Of course, it’s not as though SENA countries hadn’t been making use of their own home advantage for decades so they had nothing to complain about, but it didn’t make the losses hurt any less.South Africa’s batting has paid the highest price for that. Since May 2018, they do have a single Test batter with an average over 40 which includes all of the current squad. Tony de Zorzi, thanks to his 177, and David Bedingham, with a hundred and three fifties, are close but both have only played eight Tests.What that means is that South Africa didn’t often have hundreds, which is something they had to play down and Markram is still singing from that hymn book.”As for numbers, it’s all quite relative. You look at different surfaces that you play on, wickets around the world are so different from each other and have so many different types of challenges that you face as a batter so it can be tough to pump that average up but we don’t speak about numbers,” Markram said. “We just speak about making an impact on the game and there can be a time where scoring 60 or 70 is match-winning and then there will be times where big hundreds runs are match-winning.”In this series, the latter was the case. From Kyle Verreynne in Mirpur to de Zorzi, Tristan Stubbs and Wiaan Mulder in Chittagong, South Africa’s wins were built on big runs which gave their attack a lot to work with. And while there is some sense in what Markram said in that an individual stacking up hundreds may not necessarily equate to a successful team, he also recognised the need for a collective progression in performance.”I’m certainly not too fazed about numbers and I don’t think the rest of the guys are either. It’s one of those things that will take care of itself if you put in good performances consistently. Naturally the numbers will lift. We’re all definitely striving towards that but trying to be more consistent and trying to have a good impact on the game.”With South Africa’s batters focused on the efficacy and not the amount of their runs, it was hardly surprising to hear the leader of their attack, Kagiso Rabada, also play down his own importance. Asked about being back at No.1 on the ICC rankings or taking 300 wickets in his post-match interview, Rabada glossed over that the game “moves on”.Aiden Markram believes South Africa have the players required to reach the WTC final•AFP/Getty Images”You have to keep working hard. don’t look at where I am on the rankings,” he said, acknowledging it is a “good motivator to keep going.” His highest praise was for his team-mates, who he said are all “willing to put their hands up,” to drive success.And they can see the rewards in front of them. Despite playing fewer Tests than almost anyone else in this cycle, they’re in with a chance of making the final. They see the potential to make that happen as brimming with possibility. “We don’t really know what the ceiling is because we haven’t managed to lift the trophy,” Markram said.That’s also one way of South Africa looking at their empty accolades cupboard and wondering whether it will ever fill up. They’ve taken the approach that the things they are capable of are still coming and this year has shown them that.They reached the final of the T20 World Cup in June and now their chance to reach the WTC final lies in their hands. It’s proof that something is working, that the talent pool is starting to play to their potential and that maybe, the impossible could become possible.”We believe that we have the players in the country to be able to do so but by no means will it be easy,” Markram said. “The journey itself has been incredibly difficult but worth the fight, worth the hours, worth the sacrifice. That’s pretty much how we see it.”