SA women will solve men’s problem at WT20

Times Media

TELFORD VICE, Johannesburg

Neither for the first time nor the last, women will solve a problem for men when the World T20 semi-finals are played in Dhaka today.

Aaron Phangiso, in particular, should thank his lucky female stars if he gets a game having spent the entire group stage on the bench.

At 10.30am (SA time) today, the SA women’s team will play England. At 3pm, the SA and India men’s teams will clash.

Faf du Plessis’ team played all four of their group games in Chittagong, and he said yesterday that the women’s semi would be an important indicator of the approach his side would take into their showdown against the Indians - who will have better knowledge of the more spin-friendly conditions having played their group matches in Dhaka.

“The wicket at Dhaka is completely different to Chittagong,” Du Plessis said. “India are much more used to it than we are.

“We put in some hard practices this week on really abrasive surfaces and we over-practiced against spin, where the ball was spinning too much.

“Because there is a game before us - the ladies game - we will assess how the wicket is playing. If there is excessive spin, we will look at the option of playing ‘Phangi’.”

Imran Tahir is the leading bowler among the four teams in the semi-finals with 11 wickets at 9.18 and a decent economy rate of 6.31.

JP Duminy is SA’s second spinner, but the eight overs he has bowled in the tournament have gone for 73 runs and he has taken just one wicket.

However, Duminy is SA’s second-highest runscorer at the WT20 after Hashim Amla. Dropping him for Phangiso would be folly. If Phangiso is to play, Beuran Hendricks looks the most likely candidate to be left out.

That spin bowling is an unusually important part of SA’s arsenal in the tournament was emphasised when Shane Warne turned up at their net session on Wednesday and spent time with Tahir - the two were teammates at Hampshire - and bowling coach Allan Donald.

“It wasn’t our decision to ask Shane Warne to come in,” Du Plessis said. “He wanted to bowl a bit and he just pitched up to bowl a few balls at us. We certainly didn’t request him to come.

“I asked Imran about it and ‘Warney’ just told him he’s been bowling well and to keep up the good work.”

But Warne won’t be on hand today to help a defiant SA side, whose three wins in the event were all achieved by fewer than 10 runs, against an Indian team who have sailed unbeaten into the semis on a wave of four big victories.

“We’ve played really well as a team,” Du Plessis said. “We’ve had different guys performing in every game so we’re not relying on someone.”

If Du Plessis’ men win the WT20, they might want to show their appreciation for the help they had from the SA women’s team by giving them some of their prizemoney of US$1.1-million. That would be only fair considering the women’s champions will earn just US$70000.