South Africa’s premier T20 event, which began with great excitement in 2023, is scheduled to take place in January. Despite the possibility that it may have an impact on their qualification for the 2023 World Cup, CSA abandoned an ODI series against Australia in order to secure the tournament’s success, which hinged on the availability of their top stars. They attempted to rearrange the forthcoming Test matches against New Zealand, but once again they had to make a choice. In other words, the SA20 will be played by the first-choice selections. These newcomers are going to travel to the opposite side of the globe.
Captain Neil Brand of South Africa
Though Brand hasn’t played a Test yet, he will captain his nation on February 4. Brand is a seasoned domestic cricket player who began his professional career in Centurion and spent some time with Cardiff MCC. Additionally, he has played for the Somerset and Glamorgan Second XIs. With a career batting average of 39.27, which includes six hundreds, and a history of being a leader, he is just 94 runs short of 3000 first-class runs.
In his 51 first-class games, he has captained 18 of them. During a big portion of the 2021–22 campaign, he led Titans to the domestic first-class title and placed ninth in the competition for runs scored. In a previous series this year, he captained South Africa A against West Indies A, a match that South Africa won 2-1 and was intended to help players get ready for the Tests in New Zealand. Brand was the series’ fifth-highest run scorer with a century in the first game.
The top six
Three players with great records who have been in or near South Africa’s Test team are among the top six: David Bedingham, Zubayr Hamza, and Keegan Petersen. In the South African A series against the West Indies, Petersen and Hamza scored the most runs, respectively, and are currently competing in the rubber match against India.
After being benched against the West Indies in the summer, Petersen was called up for the Boxing Day Test. He scored two runs, but has four half-centuries in 12 Tests and eleven years of domestic cricket experience. While Hamza might play in the Test in the New Year, Bedingham, who thought about trying out for England while he was at Durham, has returned home and made his debut against India, impressing with a composed 56. Hamza has six caps, 212 runs, and a career best score of 62 from his last Test match, which was played in New Zealand in 2022. In the current domestic four-day competition, he is fourth in terms of runs scored and seems to have regained his form following a nine-month ban for doping.
Khaya Zondo, who has played five Test matches, the most recent one being against Australia earlier this year, is the only other capped batter on the 14-man roster. In the series versus West Indies A, he scored the fourth-most runs.
Along with 45.75-average Ruan de Swardt, former South African Under-19 hitter Raynard van Tonder is expected to be capped in New Zealand. Van Tonder has a first-class average of 42.84.
The assault on pace
Dane Paterson and Duanne Olivier, two former Kolpak players, will spearhead the assault and provide movement, pace, and most crucially, experience. With 15 Test matches under his belt, Olivier was becoming a fixture in the South African team until he moved to Yorkshire in 2019. With an average of 21.93, he has taken 59 wickets in Test cricket, with a high of 6 for 37 against Pakistan, three five-fors, and a ten-wicket haul.
Paterson, a bowler with a modest seam movement akin to Vernon Philander, participated in two Test matches for South Africa in 2020 before to a brief period as a Kolpak player and subsequently an overseas player for Nottinghamshire. With an average of 23.63 across more than 550 first-class wickets, he is predicted to thrive in New Zealand’s climate.
Uncapped players, such as all-rounder Mihlali Mpongwana, who was included in the ODI team for the India series but did not participate, will make up the remaining offensive lineup. T20I skipper Aiden Markram gave him high marks, saying he “thinks about the game in a great way” and adjusts effectively to conditions. He has only participated in one other first-class match this season, operating as a third and occasionally a fourth seamer in the series against West Indies A. Beside him stands swing bowler Tshepo Moreki, a former Under-19 player who has played in 93 first-class matches.
The spinners
Between 2014 and 2019, offspinner Dane Piedt represented South Africa in nine Test matches. After that, he departed the nation to play Major League Cricket. Although he currently resides in Washington, USA, he responded to Shukri Conrad’s SOS to return to South Africa this season in order to maybe visit New Zealand. Piedt, who is expected to add more international caps on this tour, was the leading wicket-taker in the series against West Indies A while playing two games for the second-division Knights.
Conrad has made the decision to include 37-year-old legspinner Shaun von Berg in the lineup, despite the fact that playing two spinners in a Test match may not be appropriate in New Zealand. Since 2009, Von Berg has participated in South Africa’s domestic game and has consistently ranked among the top wicket-takers in the first-class division. In the four-day competition, he has taken 15 wickets in five games while playing for Boland.
The keeper of wickets
Despite being a member of South Africa’s Under-19 World Cup winning team in 2014, Clyde Fortuin did not achieve the same level of success as his teammates Markram and Kagiso Rabada. Rather, he was the only wicketkeeper deployed in the A series against the West Indies and has amassed 74 first-class caps, 68 of which have come in the role of wicketkeeper. Despite having a batting average of just 27.10 overall, he has been in form recently and finished fifth in the first-class competition last season.