The South African men’s cricket team will be back in action on Wednesday in the first of three T20 Internationals against Australia, all to be played at Kingsmead in Durban. The Proteas last played in April, but are confident that despite their lack of game time, they are ready for a busy few months of white ball cricket, all leading up to the Cricket World Cup in India in October.
Proteas spin bowler, Tabraz Shamsi, says the dark circles under his eyes are testament to the hard work the team has been putting in ahead of the Australia series. The Proteas haven’t had a game since early April, when they beat the Netherlands to qualify for the ODI World Cup which begins in October. Their last T20 International series was against the West Indies in late March, which they lost.
The players have felt the kind of frustration usually reserved for an injury lay-off, according to Proteas spinner, Tabraiz Shamsi. “Four months is a bit extreme it is something that I have never experienced and I am sure most of the other guys have not experienced that sort of thing only comes when you have a long-term injury.”
It’s the hand the players have been dealt, and while their opponents, Australia, have been in the thick of it in international cricket, the Proteas players have relied on team building camps to get them up to speed for the coming months which culminate with the World Cup in October in India…
“There is pros and cons to that as we can see with the Australian guys who have played a lot of cricket they have got a number of guys who have injury concerns where we don’t necessarily have that sort of problem but having said that regular game time and especially the intensity of international cricket not having played for a while could be something could be something like that bit we have been put through our paces honestly these dark circles under the eyes they are not natural we have been working very hard a lack of sleep and stuff like that so I think we will be good.”
The white ball series against Australia will consist of 3 T20 Internationals, and five ODI’s. Shamsi is cautious when talking about warming up for the World Cup with these matches, knowing that the team will be under pressure to deliver results. “We don’t want to think too far ahead and look at the world cup because we have eight international games before that right we are representing our country we are representing the hopes of the people just because it is a world cup coming up i am sure the people are not going to be happy if we lose eight games in a row and we are fully aware of that and as players as well the world cup comes when it comes we have responsibility to play the next three T20 games which we badly want to win.
Australia, meanwhile, have quite opposite problems compared to the Proteas. Their players are in the middle of hectic schedules, which Australian batter, Travis Head, is confident his teammates can handle.
“Guys are going coming from different places there are guys coming through the ashes with a couple of weeks off guys coming in from the hundreds prep has been good training again today has been really good obviously some new faces but with the experience within the group I think it is one of the strengths of this group is to be able to go in and out of formats in and out of training and be able to prepare really, really well.”
The three match T20 International series begins in Durban at Kingsmead on Wednesday, and with matches in short supply, the team will surely have no choice but to use the T20’s as some sort of a World Cup warm-up.
Source: eNCA
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