Proteas boss explains why he’s picked Rickelton, two spinners for Wanderers Test

The Proteas have decided to unleash Lions run machine Ryan Rickelton, as well as the spin duo of Keshav Maharaj and Simon Harmer for the second Test against the West Indies, getting under way at the Wanderers on Wednesday morning.

Rickelton has been in immense form domestically and will finally get a chance to show what he can do on the international front, while Maharaj and Harmer have the tricky task of trying to extract some turn on a typically fast bowler friendly pitch.

ALSO READ: No excuses says Tony de Zorzi as Proteas batters aim to come to the party

In all, four changes have been made to the starting 11, with Wiaan Mulder also earning a recall to the Test side, while Anrich Nortje receives a rest after picking up a knock in the first Test, while Keegan Petersen, Marco Jansen and Senuran Muthusamy have been rotated out.

‘Rickelton deserves chance’

In explaining his selection decisions Proteas coach Shukri Conrad explained that he was eager to take a full look at his playing squad.

“Rickelton deserves this chance to play, as everyone knows he has been churning it (runs) out. We went with Keegan in the first Test simply because he was the incumbent,” said Conrad.

“Him (Petersen) being left out is not on the back of two non-scoring performances. As you might notice everybody in the squad has now got an opportunity to play.

“The pitch looks okay and history suggests in the last year that spinners do come into the game here. The game also doesn’t have to end on day three, Test matches are supposed to go to day five, and if it does get to day four and five I think our spinners will come into it in a big way.

“So hopefully we can get enough runs and then on days four and five our spinners can really come into it.”

Batting deficiencies

Conrad was also quizzed on the Proteas batting deficiencies, which were on full view once again at Centurion last week when they collapsed from 221/1 to 342 all out, and managed just 116 all out in the second innings.

“This brand of cricket has been bandied about quite a bit because there is a lot of talk about how we want to play our game, and it will often play itself out in the batting department. It’s no secret that we weren’t particularly good at Centurion,” admitted Conrad.

“Yes we got away with a good result. But truth be told we weren’t good. The West Indies (bowlers) were good, and the wicket was tough but that doesn’t mean we should just roll over as we did the other day and have done in the past.”

Conrad continued: “It’s a unique set of circumstances. We don’t play a lot of Test cricket and that has been well documented. So I have to find novel ways to find out more about these guys.

“If it plays itself out by giving everybody a go and seeing how they react and hopefully throughout the year we will create other opportunities.

“But that brand will take a bit longer on the batting front. On the bowling front our brand was great, we played our four quicks and showed what we are about there. I think there is just a little bit of patience required in terms of the batting side.”