Albie Morkel has been around long enough to know that coaching temptation – the urge to fiddle – can do more harm than good once a tournament is under way. Speaking before South Africa’s final group game against the UAE, the former all-rounder, now serving as a specialist consultant, set out a refreshingly light-touch approach.
“When I started my coaching career, I coached as a player. You want to make a difference on the field and you can’t,” he said. “You have to accept that fact (that you’re not on the field) and work that way. Playing is about being under pressure anyway. If you’re a coach, you want to make a difference in the game all the time, and that doesn’t help.”
Those early frustrations have led him to a simpler mantra: remove pressure, do not pile it on. “It’s about finding that middle ground where you try to help, where you take pressure off the players,” he explained.
Key facts first. South Africa go into the match two wins from three, needing one more victory to be certain of a semi-final spot. Dewald Brevis has managed just 50 runs, Kagiso Rabada only two wickets, and the batting depth has carried the side. That, in Morkel’s eyes, is no reason to panic.
“My philosophy is that once you’re here and you start thinking about technical stuff, that’s when you confuse players. It’s more about how I can actually take the pressure off them and make them believe in themselves,” he said. “The players know what they’re doing. If it’s really serious technical stuff, they need to work on it, but not during tournaments.”
Brevis, still only 22 and at his first global event, illustrates the point. His short-ball issue has been obvious, opposition analysts are targeting it, yet Morkel prefers patience to tinkering. “We feel that if we ask him to play a certain way, we’ll take away the X-factor. He’s going to break your heart at some stage, but he’s also going to win you games. So the best way for us is just to let him be that guy,” Morkel said.
Translation: accept the rough with the smooth. The Proteas’ top order is largely firing, and Brevis remains the long-term investment. There will be time in the South African summer – at franchise level, or on an away tour – to iron out technique. Right now, freedom matters more than footwork.
Rabada presents a parallel dilemma. The quick’s economy has ballooned and that last-over no-ball against Afghanistan cost the side a Super Over defeat. Experience, though, buys extra latitude.
“It’s not a concern. I think if you look around T20 cricket, that can happen to any bowler at any stage, where the pressure just gets to you and you maybe have a day like that. But he’s still our premier fast bowler and we’re going to double down on him and back him all the way,” Morkel said. “That’s the only way to go now. If you get too tactical or technical with guys like that, who know what they’re doing, y”
The abrupt ending – a stray “y” hanging in mid-air – mirrored, unintentionally, the unfinished nature of Rabada’s tournament so far. Expect him to bowl the new ball again, and at the death, because South Africa’s think-tank believe confidence beats clipboard in crunch situations.
Analytically, the stance carries logic. Fast bowlers often spike late in events once surfaces slow and lengths shorten. Brevis, meanwhile, averages 40 in domestic T20s; regression to that mean would be timely.
There is still room for coaching, just not the overt kind. Morkel spends his time creating relaxed nets, short tactical chats, and reminding youngsters that mistakes are survivable. South Africa, scarred by past knock-out defeats, could use that serenity. “We will thrive when there’s bit more on the line,” he remarked earlier in the week. Results over the next seven days will test that theory.
For now, the Proteas look content to back instinct. If Brevis swings and misses, so be it. If Rabada oversteps, they will live with it. Morkel’s task is to ensure neither man, nor anyone else, fears the next ball.
