Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Christchurch
THE world’s best batsman cut a starkly stationery figure on the boundary before the start of play at Hagley Park on Monday, chewing his fingernails while a team he would not play for went through their motions on the outfield.
AB de Villiers sticks out at the best of times, but especially when he is motionless - because that seems to happen so rarely.
On Monday, he stood still and stared as his men prepared for their World Cup warm-up game against Sri Lanka. De Villiers looked like a captain marooned on a beach gazing longingly at his ship as it slipped over the horizon. Gnawing at his nails was the least such an unfortunate could do.
Officially - or according to Cricket SA’s Twitter feed - De Villiers was “rested as a precaution due to a tight right hip”. But officially doesn’t cut much mustard in the real world of “what if”.
What if De Villiers gets no game time before SA play their first group match against Zimbabwe in Hamilton on Sunday? What if he misses it? What if he is not fit for the second match, the big one against India in Melbourne the Sunday after that? What if he can’t play in any ... let’s not go there.
Good thing, then, that most South Africans were sound asleep with no option to watch the game on television when the toss happened on Monday. So they could not see that the man who walked to the middle was clearly not the owner of the most runs in one-day internationals for SA as well as of the most 50s and the highest strike rate among their current players and the joint holder of the SA record for ODI centuries, not to mention of the fastest hundred yet scored by anyone, anywhere in the format.
Panic in the streets is best avoided, and something like panic would surely ensue if the dark thought grew wings that De Villiers could be ruled out of the World Cup.
Remove him from the equation and a large part of SA’s strength and gameplan would go with him. Opponents would rejoice. Neutrals would change the channel.
De Villiers is, the panic-stricken would shriek, worth more than any other player to SA’s World Cup cause. Or is he?
SA have won 63.79% of the 174 one-day internationals De Villiers has played for them. But they are more successful when he is not around: since De Villiers made his debut, when he does not feature in the side they win 65.71% of their ODIs.
Dale Steyn, too, is in the cold, hard light of the stats not the matchwinner he undoubtedly is by any other measure. When he plays, SA win 61.70% of the time. When he sits out, they are 63.34% successful.
Of course, none of this makes allowance for De Villiers or Steyn being rested against weaker opposition or when a series is won early.
But South Africans should be relieved to know that the man who did walk to the middle for the toss on Monday, who holds the other half of the record for ODI centuries among current SA players, who also has the highest batting average among them, was Hashim Amla.
SA win 63.55% of the ODIs Amla plays. When he is not around, that figure drops to 45%.
Keep walking, Hash.
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