SL vs SA 2018: Struggle against spin is a global issue, says Faf du Plessis

South Africa lost the 2-match Test series, 2-0.

Faf du Plessis (AFP)

Having seen his batsmen get easily rolled over against the spin of Ranagana Herath & co across 2 Test matches, Faf du Plessis has expressed the need for South Africa to better their technique while playing on turning pitches while touring in the subcontinent but he also raised an alarming issue reiterating that the struggle against spin is more a global problem and that the world, not just non-Asian teams, isn't playing the spinners too well. 

After another huge loss in the second test at the SSC, Faf said, "Our way of coming to the subcontinent needs to adapt, Whether it's playing two or even three spinners, when you come to conditions like this you give yourself the best opportunity."

Coming into this series, South Africa always wanted to pick a pace-dominated attack despite the conditions. It didn't work at all in the end, as from the 15 Sri Lankan wickets that fell, pacers got only two, with left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj clinching 12. 

Du Plessis justified it by saying, "I think it would be unfair to judge our seam bowlers on these performances, They tried hard, but it was just really tough to get something out of the wicket. The wicket was quite dusty. You saw with a lot of balls that when it hit there was a little bit of explosion. That takes out all the pace out of the delivery. Our pace factor that we had as a threat was not a weapon in these conditions."

Defending his team's embarrassing problem against spin, Faf termed it as a "global issue" and said, "Whenever a team tours the subcontinent - whether it's Australia or England or us - there's always a question mark on how you play spin. It's a world issue that we're trying to get better at, I don't think we play spin badly, but if you compare yourself to the subcontinent batters, then they're obviously a step above us in that regard."

"It has to be a case of looking at how you can get your own home conditions to try and get exposed to these kinds of conditions a little more often, when you're playing first-class cricket. That's where the challenge lies for the South Africas and the Englands and the Australias of the world."

Despite all of this, Du Plessis isn't too worried by home teams taking advantage of the conditions, and signalled that greener surfaces will be on offer when Sri Lanka tour South Africa next year.

"Teams these days make sure they can maximise their opportunity to win a game. For us, it will be similar to last time when they came over. We've got a really good seam attack so the pitches will have some pace and bounce," 

(Inputs from Cricbuzz)

 
 

By Kashish Chadha - 24 Jul, 2018

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