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Rassie van der Dussen, the stand-in T20I captain, said that South Africa were “taught a lesson in how to play in Caribbean conditions” after they were swept 3-0 by the West Indies.
Despite finishing second in T20 cricket run scoring in 2024, Van der Dussen is not included in South Africa’s squad for the T20 World Cup. He filled in for Aiden Markram as captain and No. 4 batsman, but his performance was lacklustre. South Africa lost to the West Indies in a T20I series for the second time in a row. Under white-ball coach Rob Walter, they have not won a T20I series and have continued “making the same mistakes,” according to van der Dussen.
He identified South Africa’s batting, especially upfront, as too circumspect. “From a batting front, we can maybe be just a bit braver,” he said. “We saw the way that the West Indies play, especially in the powerplay. They really take it on. When the ball’s new, it’s easier to score. It gets tough towards the back end when the ball gets soft.”
In the opening two games, West Indies scored 64 for 1 and 51 for 1 when batting first. In the last game on Sunday, they chased 164 and raced to 83 without losing in that time. South Africa scored 45 for 2 batting first, and then 46 for 3 and 85 for 2 chasing—the latter being their best powerplay score. The clear distinction is how many wickets a top order that will have to perform at the T20 World Cup has lost. Quinton de Kock and Reeza Hendricks each had some individual success, as evidenced by Hendricks’ 51-ball 87 in the opening game and de Kock’s 17-ball 41 in the second, but their partnership was only successful once.
Van der Dussen put some of that down to exhaustion and some to taking longer than they should to assess conditions, but remained harsh in his assessment. “We just couldn’t adapt early enough. We had a long week in terms of layovers in Miami and so forth. We saw that in the first match, but you can’t keep making the same mistakes.”