South African national cricket team

South African national cricket team
Test status received	1889
First Test - Match	against England at Port Elizabeth , March 1889
First ODI	against India in Kolkata , November 1991
First T20I	against New Zealand in Johannesburg , October 2005
captain	Faf Du Plessis ( test ), Quinton de Kock ( ODI & T20 )
Coach	Ottis Gibson
Official ICC test ranking	6 of 12
Official ICC ODI ranking	4 of 20
Official ICC T20I ranking	5 of 84
World Cup participation	8th
First World Cup	1992
Best World Cup result	Semi-finals (1992, 1999, 2007, 2015)
Champions Trophy participation	8th
First Champions Trophy	1998
Best Champions Trophy result	Winner (1998)
World Twenty20 participations	6th
First World Twenty20	2007
Best World Twenty20 result	Semi-finals (2009, 2014)
As of May 26, 2020

The South African national cricket team , also known as The Proteas (formerly The Springboks ), represents South Africa internationally in cricket . The national association is called Cricket South Africa .

South Africa is a full member of the International Cricket Council (ICC) and therefore approved for Test Cricket and One-Day Internationals .

In the official world rankings since 2003, South Africa was the leading nation in one-day internationals from February 18 to April 7, 2007 and again from January 30, 2009. In the test of cricket they reached first place on August 24, 2009 and thus became for some time the second nation after Australia to be in first place in both forms of play at the same time.

history

South Africa in the London Oval in August 2008

The first tour of an English team to South Africa took place in 1888-1889, when South Africa played its first Test Match in Port Elizabeth, making it the third Test nation.

South Africa celebrated its first victory on January 4, 1906 in Johannesburg against England . They recorded their first away win on January 13, 1911 in Adelaide against Australia.

From March 3 to 14, 1939, the famous timeless test between South Africa and England took place in Durban , which despite its length ended without a winner, i.e. only with a draw. The game could have continued, but the English team wanted to reach Athlone Castle , which was leaving Cape Town on March 17th , as war with Germany seemed increasingly likely.

The Imperial Cricket Conference had decided at its meeting in July 1961 the question of whether South Africa after emerging from the Commonwealth of Nations is to retain his membership in cricket's world governing body reset. In the meantime, matches between South Africa and other member countries would be considered "unofficial tests" but could possibly be recognized as official in retrospect. The series of such unofficial test matches began in early 1962 in South Africa with the team from New Zealand. Australia meanwhile pressed for a decision in the Imperial Cricket Conference , but the general meeting in July 1962 found that the special situation found for South Africa should remain unchanged. A not insignificant aspect in this situation were two ( white ) cricketers who were members of the multi-ethnic team Commonwealth XI ; Neil Adcock and Roy McLean . Both athletes took part in numerous games in various countries except South Africa in 1962. In addition, the South African and Colored Basil D'Oliveira was committed as a professional player in England.

The South African Cricket Board of Control , an institution made up of representatives from all sections of the population , pushed for international recognition to the exclusion of the exclusively “white” South African Cricket Association .

In February and March 1964, the South African team toured Australia and New Zealand . This led to protests from unions and students against the apartheid situation. In Wellington , the wicket was destroyed before play could begin. The manager of the South African team Ken Viljoen was disappointed with the low number of spectators during the stay.

Their greatest success of the pre-boycott era celebrated South Africa in the 1969/1970 season with a superior 4-0 victory in the test series against Australia . In 1970, South Africa was finally excluded from international cricket because of its apartheid policy. Before that, only England, Australia and New Zealand had played against South Africa, while countries like the West Indies and India had boycotted them beforehand. The affair of the native black South African, Basil D'Oliveira, who was competing for England, had a major influence on this decision in 1968, as did strong protests against the tour to England planned for 1970. The tour of Australia at the beginning of 1970 was the last official international tour in South Africa until it was resumed in the ICC.

This decision meant the end of the international career of some of the world's best players such as Graeme Pollock , Barry Richards or Mike Procter . It also resulted in some South Africans later playing for other countries, such as Allan Lamb and Robin Smith who played for England or Kepler Wessels for Australia. The latter became the first captain of South Africa in test matches after their readmission on April 22, 1992 against the West Indies in Barbados .

After the end of apartheid, South Africa was accepted again by the ICC as a test cricket nation in 1991. On November 10, 1991, the first official international match (also their first one-day international ever) took place against India in Calcutta , Clive Rice was their captain.

Famous players of the first decade after 1991 have included the fast bowler Allan Donald , the batsman Gary Kirsten and then as the world's best fielder applicable Jonty Rhodes , perhaps the only player of cricket history, not primarily as a batsman, bowler or Wicket- Keeper became famous.

In the 1990s, as in other sports, South Africa introduced a quota system to give non-white players access to competitive sports.

South African cricket was rocked in April 2000 by a betting scandal in which its captain and batsman Hansie Cronje was particularly involved. On October 11, he was therefore given a life ban. Cronje was killed in a plane crash in South Africa on June 1, 2002.

Makhaya Ntini

Jacques Kallis

AB de Villiers

The first all-black player in South Africa was the almost bowler Makhaya Ntini in 1998 . The team's current captain (2010) is batsman Graeme Smith . Due to a lengthy injury break from Smith, Ashwell Prince was appointed captain in July 2006, making him the first non-white cricket captain in South Africa. Other well-known players are the all-rounder Jacques Kallis , the almost bowler Dale Steyn , the wicket keeper Mark Boucher , the batsman AB de Villiers and the first player of Indian descent, the batsman Hashim Amla .

Tournaments

In tournaments, i. H. in One-Day Internationals and Twenty20 Cricket, South Africa has mostly cut below its capabilities and has earned a reputation for failing at the crucial moment. ("Chokers") Despite some strong performances in the group phases, South Africa has so far only managed to win one game in the knockout phase of a Cricket World Cup tournament.

At the 1992 World Cup , their first tournament after the resumption, they failed in the semi-finals against England. The highly controversial rain rule used in this game , which was not yet based on the Duckworth-Lewis method , is often blamed for this.

At the 1996 World Cup in India / Pakistan / Sri Lanka all five preliminary round games were won, but with the first defeat in the quarter-finals against the West Indies, the end quickly followed.

During the 1999 World Cup in England, Herschelle Gibbs had the mishap in the important second round match against Australia, dropping the ball that had actually already been caught - while trying to throw it up jubilantly - and thus let the Australian captain Steve Waugh continue in the game. He thanked him with a decisive Century , which brought Australia the victory it needed to reach the semi-finals. In this semi-final, both teams met again immediately afterwards. In the last over of the game South Africa gambled away the victory they believed to be safe due to a misunderstanding of their two batsman and only came to a draw, which Australia secured the final participation after the preliminary round results. Australia then also became world champions.

As host of the 2003 Cricket World Cup , South Africa did not get beyond the preliminary round. This was mainly due to a misunderstanding about how many runs the team needed in the last group game against Sri Lanka, as the game was about to be abandoned due to the rain that was on the horizon. South Africa could still win, however, as enough overs had been completed by then to be able to evaluate the game. However, their captain and star all-rounder Shaun Pollock misread the Duckworth-Lewis table and therefore misinformed his two batsman because he believed the target number ( target ) required to win was one less than it actually was. The game was then lost with exactly one run. Pollock then resigned as captain, but played successfully for South Africa for another 5 years.

At the 2007 World Cup in the West Indies, the team failed, after a strong start in the tournament, again to Australia in the semi-finals. With only 149 runs, she achieved her lowest result at world championships in this game.

However, the team won the first ICC Champions Trophy against the West Indies in 1998 and in the same year the only cricket tournament so far at the Commonwealth Games in Malaysia.

South Africa holds the record for the highest successful run chase in One-Day Internationals, when they snatched victory away from Australia on March 12, 2006 in Johannesburg with 438-9 in 49.5 over, i.e. with the penultimate ball. This is also the second highest number of points ever achieved (as of February 2010). The game is now considered to be the best one-day international ever.

Captains

Test match captains

So far, a total of 36 players have acted as captains for South Africa in a test match.

No.	Surname	Period
1	Owen Dunell	1889
2	William Milton	1889-1892
3	Ernest Halliwell	1896-1902
4th	Alfred Richards	1896
5	Murray Bisset	1899
6th	Henry Taberer	1902
7th	James Henry Anderson	1902
8th	Percy Sherwell	1906-1911
9	Sibley John Snooke	1910
10	Frank Mitchell	1912
11	Louis Tancred	1912
12	Herbert Taylor	1913-1924
13	Hubert Deane	1927-1931
14th	Eiulf Peter Nupen	1930
15th	Horace Cameron	1931-1932
16	Herbert Wade	1935-1936
17th	Alan Melville	1938-1947
18th	Arthur Nourse	1948-1951
19th	Jack Cheetham	1952-1955
20th	Derrick McGlew	1955-1962
21st	Clive van Ryneveld	1956-1958
22nd	Trevor Goddard	1963-1965
23	Peter van der Merwe	1965-1967
24	Aron Bacher	1970
25th	Kepler Wessels	1992-1994
26th	Hansie Cronje	1994-2000
27	Gary Kirsten	1998
28	Shaun Pollock	2000-2003
29	Mark Boucher	2002
30th	Graeme Smith	2003-2014
31	Jacques Kallis	2006-2009
32	Ashwell Prince	2006
33	Hashim Amla	2014-2016
34	AB de Villiers	2015-2016
35	Faf du Plessis	2016 – today
36	Dean Elgar	2017-2019

Stages

See also : List of test cricket stadiums

The South African team has so far used 11 stadiums on home soil for hosting friendly matches:

No.	Stadion	city	First use
1	St George's Park	Port Elizabeth	March 12, 1889
2	Newlands	Cape Town	March 25, 1889
3	Old Wanderers	Johannesburg	March 2, 1896
4th	Lord's	Durban	January 21, 1910
5	Kingsmead	Durban	January 18, 1923
6th	Ellis Park	Johannesburg	December 27, 1948
7th	The Wanderers	Johannesburg	December 24, 1956
8th	SuperSport Park	Centurion	November 16, 1995
9	Chevrolet Park	Bloemfontein	October 29, 1999
10	Buffalo Park	East London	October 18, 2002
11	Senwes Park	Potchefstroom	October 25, 2002

Balance sheet

The team has the following results against the other full members of the ICC in Test, ODI and Twenty20 cricket ( as of August 1, 2020 ).

opponent	Testing					ODIs					Twenty20s
	Sp.	S.	U	N	N	Sp.	S.	U	N	NO	Sp.	S.	U	N	NO
Afghanistan	0	0	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	0	2	2	0	0	0
Australia	98	26th	0	52	20th	103	51	3	48	1	21st	8th	13	0	0
Bangladesh	12	10	0	0	3	21st	17th	0	4th	0	6th	6th	0	0	0
England	153	34	0	64	55	63	30th	1	28	4th	18th	9	8th	0	1
India	39	15th	0	14th	10	84	46	0	35	3	15th	6th	9	0	0
Ireland	0	0	0	0	0	5	5	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
New Zealand	45	25th	0	4th	16	71	41	0	25th	5	15th	11	4th	0	0
Pakistan	26th	15th	0	4th	7th	79	50	0	28	1	14th	8th	6th	0	0
Zimbabwe	9	8th	0	0	1	41	38	0	2	1	5	5	0	0	0
Sri Lanka	29	14th	0	9	6th	77	44	0	31	0	13	7th	5	0	0
West Indies	28	18th	0	3	7th	62	44	1	15th	2	10	6th	4th	0	0

International tours

→ Main article : List of international cricket tours by the South African national cricket team

Since its full member status in the ICC, South Africa has been on bilateral tours against the other full members and other members of the ICC with ODI and Twenty20 status.

International tournaments

World cricket championship

• 1975 Not allowed to start
• 1979 Not allowed to start
• 1983 Not allowed to start
• 1987 Not allowed to start
• 1992 semi-finals
• 1996 quarter-finals
• 1999 semi-finals
• 2003 preliminary round
• 2007 semi-finals
• 2011 quarter finals
• 2015 semi-finals
• 2019 preliminary round

Champions Trophy

• 1998 winner
• 2000 semifinals
• 2002 semi-finals
• 2004 preliminary round
• 2006 semi-finals
• 2009 preliminary round
• 2013 semifinals
• 2017 preliminary round

World Twenty20

• 2007 Super 8
• 2009 semi-finals
• 2010 Super 8
• 2012 Super 8
• 2014 semi-finals
• 2016 Super 10

Notes and sources

1. ↑ The South African national rugby team is still called that today.
2. ↑ Timeless Test - Cricinfo
3. ↑ ^{a b} SAIRR : A Survey of Race Relation 1962 . Johannesburg 1963, p. 220.
4. ↑ SAIRR: A Survey of Race Relation 1964 . Johannesburg 1965, p. 344.
5. ^ First test match after the end of apartheid
6. ^ Quota System Telegraph.co.uk
7. ^ Lifelong ban on Hansie Cronje
8. ↑ Hansie Cronje - Plane Crash
9. ↑ The time period refers to the corresponding cricket season in which the first or last game of the time as captain took place
10. ↑ Records / South Africa / Test Matches / Result Summary ( English ) Cricinfo. January 29, 2013. Accessed July 31, 2020.
11. ↑ Records / South Africa / One-Day Internationals / Result Summary ( English ) Cricinfo. Accessed July 31, 2020.
12. ↑ Records / South Africa / Twenty20 Internationals / Result Summary ( English ) Cricinfo. Accessed July 31, 2020.

Web links

• Cricket South Africa