Former Proteas fast bowler Mfuneko Ngam believes South Africa’s success so far in the Cricket World Cup in India is due to the knowledge of subcontinent conditions gathered by players and coaching staff in the Indian Premier League.
Temba Bavuma’s charges have convincingly won their first two matches — against Sri Lanka by 102 runs in New Delhi, before dominating Australia by 134 runs in Lucknow.
They will hope for their third straight win against the Netherlands at HPCA Stadium in Dharamshala on Tuesday (10.30am).
Often in the past South African teams struggled to quickly adjust to the slow and spinning surfaces in India. However, Rob Walter’s men have immediately adapted to the conditions.
Ngam — born and raised in Middledrift, about 90km from East London in the Eastern Cape and who played three Test matches for the national side — attributed the quick adjustment to the number of the national team's players who ply their trade in the IPL.
Quinton de Kock, Kagiso Rabada, Aiden Markram, David Miller, Anrich Nortjé, Heinrich Klaasen, Rassie van der Dussen, Marco Jansen and Tabraiz Shamsi have all played in the premier T20 competition in world cricket, and have experience of Indian conditions.
“They have good leadership in [coach] Rob Walter and bowling coach Eric Simons,” Ngam said. “Both of them have been involved in the IPL and they know the conditions in India very well. Walter has worked with the Pune Warriors and Delhi Daredevils.
“Everyone in our middle order in the competition is averaging over 40 and the way they play spin is good. Teams use the new ball and then turn early to spin in India, we saw Afghanistan beating England with that tactic.
“You look at our players, the way they play spin has been excellent because they are used to the conditions — and even our bowlers have been varying the pace well and bowling good lines on the slow pitches.”
The Netherlands, ranked 14th in the world in the ODI format, have five South African-born players in their squad: batters Colin Ackermann and Sybrand Engelbrecht, spinning all-rounder Roelof van der Merwe and fast-medium bowlers Ryan Klein and Wesley Barresi.
The match against the Dutch will provide an opportunity for South Africa to tighten up aspects of their game that need working on, and get everything in place in time for the back end of the World Cup. However, they will be wary of what happened at the Adelaide Oval in 2022 at the ICC T20 World Cup when the Netherlands beat the Proteas by 13 runs.
“It will be important to not take the Netherlands for granted. We saw what they did in the T20 World Cup and we are still in pain from that because they denied us an opportunity to proceed further in that tournament,” Ngam said.
“Netherlands will come with belief in the match. They have South African-born players in their team and they will want to make sure they play well.
“South Africa will have to follow their blueprint that they have shown so far in the competition and treat the match as if they were playing Australia or India. They have to execute their plans properly.”
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