I was uber chuffed when an email popped up in my in-box from Vincent Hofmann inviting me to the SA Cricket Awards Gala Dinner. As a blogger I don’t often get invited to official events and it’s very difficult for me to get access to the players. Vincent and I were accompanied by Mike Stopforth for the evening festivities.

It’s fantastic to see a sports organization like Cricket South Africa embracing social media, their #CSAawards campaign on Twitter was a creative value add to the evening, and it showed how social media can compliment a live event. When writing this article I counted that there were 1024 tweets with the #CSAawards hashtag, which is an awesome level of interaction. CSA has encouraged the players to join Twitter which is a great step forward in giving their fans access to the players on an individual bases.

The various sponsors of the event also made use of social media to cover the event, Standard Bank, Cricket South Africa and KFC Fangaea we’re all tweeting like crazy and posting Twitpics in an effort to include the general public. They even had the presenter Ryan O’Connor reading out tweets from an iPad!

Cricket South Africa have a great Facebook page another sign of the integration of Cricket and social media, now if only we could find more cricket bloggers….

Mark Boucher, me, Graeme Smith and Roelof van der Merwe at the CSA Awards

When South Africa took on the West Indies in the 5th ODI we were all surprised to see Mark Boucher come onto the field for his 292nd ODI cap as a fielder, the first time without the keepers gloves.

Boucher fielded all over the park and at one point was down on the boundary at third man, Boucher did well in the field, his throwing in from the boundary needs some work though. Mark Boucher took a brilliant catch at mid wicket to dismiss Darren Bravo, this was Mark Boucher’s 400th ODI catch, and the first one without the gloves:

I was incensed when news broke that Mark Boucher had been dropped from the Protea’s T20 and ODI squads to play the West Indies following the poor performance of the Proteas in the ICC World T20.

My initial reaction was, how can we drop the guy who always seems to be there for us when we need him? He’s been a pillar in the South African team for years, he’s broken all sorts of records along the way… How can we drop him while preparing for the World Cup which is just 15 ODI’s away?

Once my anger had subsided, I started investigating the statistics of Mark Boucher’s batting over the years, it became apparent that he hasn’t been the ‘the guy who saves the day’ for a while. The last time Boucher scored a half century in an ODI was on 31 October 2008 and that was against Kenya, prior to that he scored 55* against India on 29 June 2007.

Some may argue that playing most of your career at number 6 and 7 isn’t conducive to scoring half centuries and bigger scores, so I looked at his average from 16 January 2009, the start of the tour to Australia to his last ODI played against India on 27 February this year. Boucher scored 329 runs in 17 innings, he was not out in 6 of those innings, which gives him an average of 29.91 in that period. That average is slightly higher than his career average of 28.93.

Mark Bouchers batting average shows that he hasn’t set the world alight with his batting efforts, unfortunately for Mark the top five batsmen in the Proteas team have not performed very well in ODI cricket in the past few months. The poor performance of the top order has exposed Mark Boucher as a batsman and he’s taken the fall.

I understand that the dynamics in a team do not always allow for your best players to be included in every game, the coaching staff have reacted to the pressure and opted to hand the gloves to AB de Villiers which allows them to play the extra batsman in the team.

I’m not saying that I would have dropped Mark Boucher, but I understand.

While I was searching YouTube for the video of Sulieman Benn Vs Brad Haddin, I found this video of Mark Boucher giving it to a Zimbabwean batsman. I’m not sure what ‘Tendai’ chirped to get this abuse, but it’s really funny.

Cricket South Africa on Friday named Ryan McLaren and Heino Kuhn as new caps in their various limited overs squads for the series against Zimbabwe and England.

McLaren, has been included in the ODI squad for the two-match MTN series against Zimbabwe as well as the first three matches of the MTN series against England and the two Standard Bank Pro20 Internationals.

This is one of three changes to the Proteas’ Standard Bank ODI squad. McLaren takes the place of Robin Peterson while two long-serving Proteas’ players, Herschelle Gibbs and Makhaya Ntini, drop out to make room for Alviro Petersen and Charl Langeveldt. Loots Bosman also makes a comeback to the Proteas’ squad for the Pro20 series.

The omission of Herschelle Gibbs means that Jacques Kallis will be used as an opening batsman in the ODI’s, according to the convenor of selectors for the South African team, Mike Procter.

Kuhn, a wicketkeeper-batsman from the Nashua Titans franchise, gets his chance in the 20 overs format of the game for the two Standard Bank Pro20 Internationals against England. I’d suggest that Kuhn has been selected as the under study to Mark Boucher as approaches his 33^rd birthday on 3 December.

The selectors have also named the two South Africa A sides to play against England. There are interesting captaincy choices in Hashim Amla and Justin Ontong while Rilee Rossouw and CJ de Villiers have both been rewarded for their outstanding performances in the Champions’ League tournament.

Proteas Suads:

Proteas’ Standard Bank ODI squad: Graeme Smith (Nashua Cape Cobras, capt), Hashim Amla (Nashua Dolphins), Johan Botha (Chevrolet Warriors), Mark Boucher (Chevrolet Warriors), AB de Villiers (Nashua Titans), JP Duminy (Nashua Cape Cobras), Jacques Kallis (Chevrolet Warriors), Charl Langeveldt (Nashua Cape Cobras), Ryan McLaren (Diamond Eagles), Albie Morkel (Nashua Titans), Wayne Parnell (Chevrolet Warriors), Alviro Petersen (bizhub Highveld Lions), Dale Steyn (Nashua Titans), Lonwabo Tsotsobe (Chevrolet Warriors), Roelof van der Merwe (Nashua Titans).

Proteas’ Standard Bank Pro20 squad: Graeme Smith (Nashua Cape Cobras, capt), Yusuf Abdulla (Nashua Dolphins), Loots Bosman (Nashua Dolphins), Johan Botha (Chevrolet Warriors), Mark Boucher (Chevrolet Warriors), AB de Villiers (Nashua Titans), JP Duminy (Nashua Cape Cobras), Jacques Kallis (Chevrolet Warriors), Heino Kuhn (Nashua Titans), Charl Langeveldt (Nashua Cape Cobras), Ryan McLaren (Diamond Eagles), Albie Morkel (Nashua Titans), Wayne Parnell (Chevrolet Warriors), Dale Steyn (Nashua Titans), Roelof van der Merwe (Nashua Titans).

Mark Boucher and Albie Morkel put on a world class batting performance to help South Africa to victory by four wickets with four balls to spare in the first Standard Bank Pro20 international against Australia at Liberty Life Wanderers in Johannesburg on Friday. Earlier in the evening, the Australians posted 166/7 with more than half those runs coming from the bat of David Hussey. Australia were in deep trouble in the 10th over; they were 71/5 as a result of the failure of four of the top six Australian batsmen not reaching double figures.

Hussey was in total control as he raced to 88 runs off 44 balls while the rest of the Australian team crumbled. Hussey got hold of Dale Steyn in the 18th and 20th over, smashing him for 32 runs.

South Africa started slow with Amla and Gibbs opening the batting, the pressure of a climbing run rate took its toll as the batsmen tried to engineer run scoring shots. The regular fall of wickets put South Africa in a spot of trouble and by the 15th over  they needed 62 runs with five batsmen already back in the dugout.

At one point The Proteas needed 12 runs per over and it didn’t look like a victory for South Africa was on the cards; enter the explosive Albie Morkel and the ever cool Mark Boucher. The experience of Mark Boucher ensured the run rate picked up, with the now established ODI and Pro20 player Albie Morkel at the other end hitting a match winning 37 off 19 balls.

Liberty Life Wanderers was packed to capacity; the expectant crowd as vocal as ever as in every encounter between the home side and the Australians at the bull ring. The spectacular turn out was a fantastic advertisement for local cricket and the upcoming IPL to be hosted in South Africa. Not even a short interruption from the lights going out could put a dampener on the event.

We look forward to another great game at SuperSport Park in Centurion on Sunday afternoon.

The Ball Theory; as explained by fans at the Wanderers