Temba Bavuma doesn’t have faith in “fake it till you make it”. He would much rather the whole world knew his team is a work in progress. Despite winning the fifth consecutive bilateral series against Australia, which was also away from home, Bavuma believes South Africa are nowhere near the perfect team he envisions for the 2027 World Cup.
The Proteas wrapped up the series with one game to spare, but had to suffer a huge defeat in the dead rubber. The 276-run margin tainted the series win for the visitors, but even without that, Temba wouldn’t have dropped the argument that their transition phase doesn’t end with a couple of victories.
“You’re seeing new faces in the team and that’s all part of us being in that exploration phase,” Bavuma said after their defeat in Mackay. “We’re getting to understand guys, what roles they can fulfil within the team, and what they bring in from a personality point of view. We have time. There are two years left, and we’re definitely not close to where we want to be as a team.”
There was, however, no hopelessness in his tone, and why would there be? South Africa still have two years before they welcome teams for the World Cup in their backyard. With young faces already a part of the setup, time, at least, would be the least of their concerns. They handed debut ODI caps to Dewald Brevis, after his heroics in the T20I leg, and spinner Prenelan Subrayen. The latter sat out the last two games with his action reported, while the former failed to replicate his T20I form. Brevis, while on a rescue mission in the third match, missed what would have been his first half-century by one run. Bavuma isn’t worried about him in the slightest. He believes more game time will help Brevis learn to maintain a balance in his batting.
“It’s refreshing watching him kind of go about his business. He’s not fazed by anything. What’s also quite refreshing is seeing his reaction when he does go out. For him, it’s all about, he should have hit the ball harder. Maybe the more experienced guys will be thinking, was that a good decision or not? But there’s an exuberance of youth from him,” Bavuma said. “The longer he plays, the more he’ll start getting a little bit more batsmanship in his game, especially in the longer formats. For now, it’s entertaining for not just the fans, but for us within the team as well.”
Among the South African batters, only Matthew Breetzke managed to go full throttle. In two innings, he scored 145 runs before getting sidelined for the final ODI with a hamstring issue. His half-century in the first game was clouded over by Keshav Maharaj’s spectacular display of spin in the opening ODI when he played havoc with the Australian batting lineup.
The conditions in Australia’s Top End venues were largely unknown before the start of this tour. South Africa managed to hit the bull’s eye despite that and the fact, as said by Bavuma, that they weren’t at their best. He said he is excited to see what becomes of the team once they are past this trial-and-error phase.
“As much as we won the series, we felt that we weren’t anywhere near our best. So I guess that’s exciting as well, to see us when we start playing close to 100%,”
“That we can win away from home – that’s a big thing,” he said. “In terms of what we’re trying to build and achieve as a team, we want to keep building on that winning habit, in whatever format it is. We want every opportunity to keep our standard up, from a skill point of view.”
