Ottis can’t figure out why the Proteas are batting so badly
Ironically, it might not even be his headache for much longer.
Ottis Gibson. (Photo by Thinus Maritz / Gallo Images)
Ottis Gibson’s Proteas may have had Dale Steyn, Kagiso Rabada and Duanne Olivier, but without enough runs on the board it was never going to be enough to avoid the stain of the most shocking defeat ever inflicted on South Africa at home, the coach has admitted.
“Even with the best bowling attack in the world, you still need runs to work with and over the two Tests we just never had enough runs. We can’t blame the pitch, we just didn’t apply ourselves and Oshada Fernando and Kusal Mendis showed in that last partnership how Test cricket should be played.
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“In Durban we had the opportunity to bat them out of the game, we didn’t and then one guy played a blinder to make the difference. Here, we made only 222 on a good pitch but our bowlers still gave us another opportunity, but again we did not bat them out of the game and they were able to stay in the contest long enough to take the sting out of our attack a bit,” Gibson said in Port Elizabeth.
Much has been said about the pitches South Africa have produced in their home lair of late, with Sri Lanka being the first team to win a series here since January 2016, but Gibson said he does not believe the batting collapses in the last two Tests were linked to how tough the surfaces had been previously.
“There’s been a lot of talk about spicy wickets but we only ask for pace and bounce. We got runs on those pitches previously, but we just have not batted well against Sri Lanka, there’s no hiding from that. And I don’t agree that we were complacent, we prepared exactly the same way as we did for India and Australia.
“So I can’t really put my finger on why we batted so badly and I don’t think the World Cup coming up had anything to do with it either because not everyone in the Test team is vying for a place in that squad. In any case, all the players’ minds should have been very fixed on this game especially after losing in Durban,” Gibson said.
South Africa’s next Test assignment in September will see them get a taste of their own medicine as they travel to the sandpits of India. But Gibson might not be involved in South African cricket anymore seeing as though his contract is only until the World Cup.
So South Africa’s batting woes could become someone else’s problem.
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