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Cape Town - The South Africa Under-19s are keen to build on from yesterday’s 10-wicket, bonus-point victory over Namibia with an even stronger performance when they meet England in their first ever day/night match at home in the Cricket South Africa (CSA) Youth One-Day International Triangular Series at Senwes Park on Sunday.
Opening batsman, Matthew Breetzke is looking forward to playing under lights at an Under-19 level and is eager to see how his teammates respond to the new challenge.
“I think there’s a lot of excitement going into tomorrow’s match because most of the guys haven’t played under lights before,” he said. “It’s going to be a new thing and with the World Cup coming up and a couple of day/night games in the fixtures, this is going to be good preparation.”
The 19-year-old from Port Elizabeth already has a First Class match under his belt for the Warriors, but is excited to be back playing at this level and hopes to play a role in a series win for the hosts. He (Breetzke 51*) and his opening partner, Jiveshen Pillay (31*) played a mature innings in their 91-run chase, reaching their target in 16.2 overs achieving a clinical win for their team.
“From my own point of view, I was really looking forward to coming back into the U19 set-up, I always enjoy playing here and it was a good first outing for us. I liked batting with Jiveshen (Pillay) we got another 50 partnership and I’m looking forward to the rest of the series and hopefully being able to play a part in the team’s success.”
Although he was delighted with the team’s win against Namibia, Breetzke believes that the team will need to raise the bar when they take on a “much stronger” England outfit on Sunday. He remarked that the side will need to excel at all three disciplines of the game and stick to their basics in order to return a positive result.
“I think spinners are gonna play a massive role in this series because the wickets here are quite slow,” he continued. “We’re gonna have to play the positive brand of cricket that we did in the first game, but on a higher level when we play England tomorrow. If we do our basics right and we keep upping the effort on our batting, bowling and fielding, I’m sure that we’ll be more than up for the challenge.”
