‘Full steam ahead’: Proteas picking strongest team for Netherlands clash

Despite facing one of the tournament’s minnows, head coach Rob Walter says the Proteas will not be taking their foot off the pedal and will field a full-strength team against the Netherlands in Dharamshala on Tuesday.

After securing dominant Cricket World Cup victories over Sri Lanka and Australia, Walter said they were “unlikely” to rest key players against their unfancied opposition, who were still in search of their first win of the global showpiece.

With four full days of rest between each of their first three games, the Proteas players were still feeling fresh. And while he admitted rotation might be important later in the six-week tournament, Walter felt it was more important to ensure they racked up as many points as they could in the round robin stage.

“The beauty of the start of our campaign is that we’ve had nice breaks between each fixture, so we’ve been able to recover well, train well and prepare well. So from our point of view it’s just about playing whatever team we feel is strongest on the day,” Walter said at the weekend.

“If some injuries get thrown our way later on in the tournament, or when we do play three games in eight days, we might have a conversation there. But for now it’s full steam ahead.

“Everyone is training particularly well. The guys have put in the hard yards… and it’s nice to know there’s nobody we can look at in the squad who I don’t think is ready to compete if they get tapped on the shoulder.”

Avoiding an upset

Though they fell in a shock defeat to the Netherlands at last year’s T20 World Cup, which ultimately knocked them out of the tournament, Walter said South Africa were not placing any real emphasis on past defeats.

The Netherlands, ranked 14th in the world in the ODI format, have never reached a World Cup playoff.

Walter, however, insisted the Proteas were not underestimating any of their opponents, and he admitted they were on their toes going into the clash as they attempted to avoid any upsets in search of their maiden World Cup title.

“As we know, in this game, anyone can beat anyone. If you don’t rock up on the day, you can find yourself under pressure,” said Walter, who took over as Proteas limited overs coach earlier this year.

“So really the process that we have followed leading into each game so far stays exactly the same. We don’t disrespect any opposition by viewing them as lesser opponents.

“For us, every game is exactly the same thing – an opportunity to play the way we want to play the game, put our best foot forward, take care of our prep leading into the game, and obviously fight really hard for those two points.”