Two centuries and one near-miss
Confetti from this week's action
Three players delivered good knocks with the bat.
Jean du Plessis
If you haven’t heard of it yet, Jean du Plessis became only the third South African batter to score a double hundred and a century in the same match. Adam Bacher achieved the feat in 1996/97 when Transvaal faced off against Griqualand. Bacher scored 210 and an unbeaten 112. In the same season, Herschelle Gibbs achieved it when South Africa played India A at Nagpur. Gibbs scored an unbeaten 200 and 171 in the same match.
Early in November 2023, du Plessis scored 203 and an unbeaten 101 in the first and second innings. Du Plessis’ feat came with caveats, he did it in Division 2, against one of the worst teams in the league. Border is languishing in sixth place on a seven-team table and is yet to win a match.
Division 2 bowling lineups are mostly middle-of-the-road attacks, nothing great, but enough to keep teams honest and win the odd match. That's why the Tuskers were busy on the market in the off-season. They picked up as many former Knights players as they could after the latter was relegated to Division 2 and they took their place place in the topflight.
But, a bowler's currency is wickets and a batter's currency is runs. Any batter worth his salt is supposed to dominate weaker attacks. Exceptional batters crush them, trample them, nine out of 10 times.
Jarrod Kimber made this point clear using Don Bradman as an example. The cricket legend destroyed the weak bowling attacks he faced. In his time, the weakest attacks he played against were India and South Africa. Bradman averaged 205.50 against South Africa and 178.75 against India. He was ruthless against them.
Sachin Tendulkar was equally merciless against the weak bowling attacks of his era. He moered Zimbabwe, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. The bottom line is, a good batter should fill their boots against weaker attacks.
This week, du Plessis faced an attack a few rungs higher than the Border attack he decimated. India A's attack had familiar faces, Shardul Thakur, Tushar Deshpande and Prasidh Krishna. Du Plessis scored a century and an unbeaten half-century in the match.
One of the exciting parts of his innings was his running between the wickets, he put the fielders under pressure, taking quick singles and valuable twos and threes. He looks like someone who can build an innings and puts a high price on his wicket.
Highlights reel:
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Dewald Brevis:
Dewald Brevis didn’t look like a player who had just scored his maiden first-class century as he walked off the field on Thursday. He didn't look like a batter who had bounced back from scoring a pair in his previous four-day outing. He was unhappy with himself.
Of course, the century is going to be a cherished one, like his first century for Northerns, which he scored when was 11 years old. It was at an Under-11 tournament held at Kearsney College. He scored 140 runs from 82 deliveries as he led the team to victory.
Brevis was unhappy because he felt that he had left runs out there. He was convinced that he could have scored more and helped his team earn a stronger foothold in the match, which is true. After his dismissal, the Titans collapsed. His maiden first-class ton had stuff in common with his List A 100 in October.
Brevis’ 116 from 118 53.46% of the Titans’ score in a match where all 11 batters batted. The only other batter to make a meaningful contribution was Donovan Ferreira, who managed 44 off 41 balls. Four other batters scored single-digit scores and three more did not score any runs at all.
Brevis is enjoying a good domestic season so far. He has registered two List A 100s in 4 games and a half-century (94). He also has two first-class 50s to add to his ton.
Highlights reel:
Rubin Hermann:
Richard Williams always thought that Serena would go on to have a better tennis career than Venus. He was right. Venus has had a good career while Serena achieved greatness. Serena is 15 months younger than Venus, and that is a big reason why.
According to research, in about two out of three cases, when a pair of siblings plays the same sport professionally, the younger one goes on to be more successful. And that is because of the ‘little sibling effect.’
First, older siblings give young children someone to learn from. When two or more people work together to learn a particular task, it is called dyadic learning. This is more conducive to learning new skills. Backyard cricket is one example of it. During these sessions, if I may call it that, younger siblings benefit more because they can learn more from their siblings than vice versa.
The gap in years also represents a gap in experience, which means that younger siblings are challenged more. “The science of this is the optimal challenge point – the sweet spot at which athletes learn skills at the fastest rate, a concept developed by scientists Mark Guadagnoli and Tim Lee. Essentially, athletes learn far more when they fail regularly,” says Tim Wigmore, author of The Best: How Elite Athletes Are Made.
This is one of the reasons why Jordan Hermann has a bigger profile than his brother, Rubin. Jordan benefitted from Rubin and Devon (the third brother) challenging him regularly.
In the past week, Rubin reminded the world that he is out there, and is an able cricketer. The 26-year-old was part of the SA A team that faced India A. He would consider himself to be unlucky to have missed out on a century, but his innings of 96 showed how good a player he is.
Highlights reel:
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Thanks for reading. Until next time… - CS