Brad Pitt, acting as the titular Mr. Smith in the 2005 smash hit Mr. and Mrs. Smith, once said that sometimes, in the end, you start thinking about the beginning. It’s not been announced yet that we’ve reached the end, but rumours are flying that the 2024 World T20 will very well be the end of the road for multiple South African cricketers, in green and gold at least.
Quinton de Kock, the Johannesburg-born superstar, whom some view as the best wicket-keeper batsman of his era, has already retired from Test cricket and One Day International (ODI) cricket, and he very well may be done with the game full stop if the rumours are to be believed. But if this is to be the end, one can only hope that he will finish with a flourish worthy of one of the greatest cricketers to ever don the Protea version of the baggy green.
That said, though, he enters the Indian Premier League in the middle of a horror batting run. Having finished the World Cup with more runs in one tournament than any South African ever, he’s seemingly run out of runs. Thankfully for South Africa, this hasn’t mattered much, as he’s been in a bad run of form for his franchises. As the presumed face for the franchise for Durban’s Super Giants, de Kock put up one solitary fifty in 12 matches as he scored 213 runs at an average of 19.36 and a strike rate of 123, which is not bad but definitely not great. Prior to the SA20, he was actually in even worse form, scoring 104 runs in the Big Bash League at an average of 17.33 and a strike rate of 120, with a top score of 38.
In other words, he enters the IPL with something to prove. The worrying thing is, I’m not sure he’s actually going to get too many chances to prove these things. In the 2023 IPL season, de Kock played all of four games. Now, he didn’t play too badly in those four games, averaging 35.75 at a strike rate of 140. But there’s certainly a chance that he will spend much of this season on the bench. Kyle Mayers is still there, and his bowling ability does mean he provides a certain level of dynamism, being able to essentially impact a game more than any other player in the team, by virtue of being an opening bowler who can bowl four overs. Nicholas Pooran is an overseas player who carried the gloves last season, and while KL Rahul isn’t allowed to keep to start the tournament, he will likely want to get some time with the gloves under his belt before the World T20, making Quinton’s path to the starting XI even more complicated.
Cricket South Africa (CSA) are not going to drop their incumbent opener for the World T20 just before the tournament proper. That would be craziness. He’s only played three T20 games for the Proteas in the last 15 months, but he did score a century in the second-last game he played for the team, so really there’s no concern from a national team perspective, I suppose. I mean, we’ve had multiple T20 matches since which we’ve just let him skip, despite the fact that he doesn’t play Test cricket, so I’m not sure why he doesn’t need the game time, but I’ve long since accepted that CSA are a poorly managed organisation, and it does me no good to get upset by things I can’t change. In any case, the Proteas won’t drop him, but it would be really nice if he went into the World T20 and he wasn’t in the kind of form which has seen other players dropped for less. If this is the end for Quinton de Kock as a Protea, I hope he gets to the World T20 in the best possible form.
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