Proteas coach explains T20 World Cup selections

Proteas white-ball coach Rob Walter has explained how he selected the squad for the T20 World Cup.

Without any recent international cricket in the T20 format, Walter was forced to look at past performances and use his gut.

Proteas coach explains T20 World Cup squad

Walter has explained how he made his picks.

“There are various criteria,” Walter told the Daily Maverick. 

“Performances this year, performances over the last year, historical performances further back than that, the make-up of squads, the potential conditions that we are going to have to balance.

“And then there’s the good old-fashioned coach’s gut feeling.”

Out-of-sorts stars

Questions about players’ form have come up.

Anrich Nortje and Marco Jansen are two players whose form in the IPL has been short of expectations.

However, Walter feels they will come good.

“I trust the quality of the players,” Walter said. 

“Anrich has another month before the World Cup starts. [I] have no doubt that he will hit his straps.

“It’s good to see that his speed is up, along with playing time and training. He’ll start to get his feel [of the game] back, no doubt. And with Marco [Jansen] the same.

“We are in touch with these guys continuously, ensuring that they are putting in the work. They understand that the turnaround is short and that they need to be ready when the time comes.

“We just need to trust the quality of the players and make sure that we… hit the ground running.”

Walter was named ODI and T20I coach of the Proteas on 16 January 2023.

One big surprise

Dolphins quick Ottniel Baartman was a surprise inclusion, but he has been red-hot in domestic cricket.

“If you’re going to talk about someone who has forced his name into the squad, you’ll have to talk about Ottniel,” Walter said.

“Over the last couple of years he’s been outstanding, but in particular in the SA20. I felt he was a cut above the rest. He really showed himself as a quality death bowler in particular. If you look at the numbers, he’s been successful through all the phases of the game.

“He’s worked really hard to get his name in the mix through sheer performance and it’s a pleasure to be able to reward those guys when it happens.”

Proteas coach has nobody else to blame

Unlike previous tournaments, the selection of this team was left to Walter.

However, that does mean that he will have no excuse if the team flops.

“My number-one imperative is to create a winning Proteas team,” Walter said.

“In order to do that, every time I pick a side, I’ve got to pick the best team at the time that I think will give us a chance of doing that.

“That said, the [domestic] system needs to up the ante so that in six months’, 12 months’ or two years’ time, and in particular when we reach the 2027 World Cup at home, [hopefully] the demographics of our team are different.

“Outside of the World Cup we’ll continue to use our bilateral series to do exactly that – to grow our base of players, to create international opportunity, to give opportunities for players to take their skills to a higher level.

“And [we’ll continue to] make sure that we’ve bought into and are delivering on a process that’s going to change what our team looks like as we move forward.”