UJ have been hard at work preparing for the inaugural Varsity Cricket tournament taking place in Potchefstroom from 3-8 February and have been working closely with the Gauteng Strikers as they look to get off to a winning start in the competition.

UJ coach Richard Das Neves has a healthy relationship with the Strikers, and more importantly their coach Enoch Nkwe, and believes it is this relationship that will contribute to providing the province with future players who could make an impact for the franchise and, hopefully, the country.

“I have actively tried to form a relationship with the Strikers and their coach Enock and thankfully, we have a good understanding. In the past, it’s been a tricky relationship but that’s a thing of the past.

“My main jobs is to produce cricketers for the province because I feel that’s what university level is all about. We want to see the guys kick-on and play provincial and franchise cricket, and maybe later on representing our country,” he told varsitysportssa.com.

The Johannesburg institution has a proud history of producing franchise and international players with the likes of current Lions captain Stephen Cook and former Proteas cricketer Neil McKenzie having connections to the university. That tradition has been kept alive with the next generation of players being groomed to carry on the proud legacy of UJ cricket.

“We have a proud history of supplying Gauteng cricket with provincial players. Among others, at the moment the current Lions captain Stephen Cook is one of them and so is former Protea Neil McKenzie. I have working on getting Neil to come speak to the squad to provide them with a little insight into how to handle the middle overs and also to help the batsmen with how to approach the various stages of the match.

“The legacy of providing Gauteng with future franchise players is still alive and kicking with the likes of SA Under-19 cricketers Yaseen Valli, Grant Roelofsen and Keith Dudgeon in our current squad. Valli and Dudgeon also has experience with the Strikers team and are exciting prospects for the franchise,” he added.

Das Neves has had a challenging start to his tenure since being appointed in September 2014 and feels he has a good balance between experienced and inexperienced players in his current squad.

“I took over as head coach in September and inherited a squad that the previous coach had, so trying to get new structures in and what we want to achieve leading into Varsity Cricket has been a challenge with the time that we have had.

“Despite that, I think we have a good blend between our first years and a few guys who will be in their third or fourth year of studies. It’s been a bit of a challenge getting the new recruits registered but the squad is shaping up nicely,” he stated.

A winning start will be vital to the morale of the team and provide the momentum needed in a short, compact tournament.

“In 20-over cricket, the games are always close and individual performances can win the game for you but momentum plays a bigger role than form. If you get on a winning streak, momentum in this format becomes quite good and to get-off to a winning start is vitally important.

“We play seven games, so there’s not much time to get into the tournament, so you need to get off to a winning start and kick on from there.

The UJ coach believes the addition of the Power Play Plus Over will be the game breaker and feels it would be interesting to see how the teams use it to their advantage. Doubling the runs scored in that over seems to favour the batsmen but Das Neves believes the bowler’s execution could play a bigger role than everyone expects.

“From a tactical point of view, it’s going to be tough for a coach to figure out how best to go about using that over and attack in it. The danger of going into full attack mode is losing wickets which could see you heading backwards.

“The players are excited about it because there’s extra incentive and something different for them to look forward to, probably more so for the batters than the bowlers. I feel though that if you get the bowlers to buy-in on the over, like I have with my bowlers, you could win the game for the team with a few wickets.

“It’s definitely exciting, whether it’s a long term thing, I’m not really sure but Varsity Sports in general is always pro-active when it comes to bringing in new innovations,” he said.