Marques, Beyers and Brydon...

Cricket South Africa and the Bangladesh Cricket Board appear to have formed a strategic alliance ahead of the multi-format tour of South Africa in November. It is centred around sending a variety of touring squads to South Africa for some embarrassingly one-sided winter thrashings.

An ‘A’ team could muster totals of just 122 and 112 in response to the SA ‘A’ team’s 647-6 to lose by a withering innings and 413 runs. It ranks only 30^th on the list of ‘heaviest innings defeats’ in history which is topped by Railways innings & 851 run demolition of Dera Ismail Khan in Lahore in 1964. The mind boggles. Was Ismail Khan alone?

While the ‘A’ teams were playing in Pretoria, two ‘Emerging’ XIs were in combat down the road at Willowmore Park where the tourists fared a little better with totals of 271 and 210 in reply to the SA Emerging XIs single innings of 497-8 declared in which JP King scored 149 and Mitchell van Buuren, ‘emerging’ at the age of 28, made 86. 29-year-old Dayyaan Galiem opened the bowling and belted 69 at number eight. An innings and 16-runs was the margin.

It is hard to know what to make of these games except that they clearly carry far more gravitas than any domestic fixtures when it comes to national selection for the Proteas. In which case, the argument to include Marques Ackerman is now insurmountable. The 30-year-old made 256 against Bangladesh with scores of 173 and 134 in two of his four previous innings. His 11-year career has produced a batting average of 48.4.

Once or twice in a generation, in every country, there comes a time and a place for a player who simply cannot be overlooked. In the mid-1990s coach Bob Woolmer selected Jacques Kallis at number seven. England dropped the great Graham Thorpe to include Kevin Pietersen in the 2005 Ashes. Shukri Conrad knows Ackerman deserves to play but said recently: “Where do we fit him in? Who gets dropped?” That is his problem and it should not be tackled with shoulder-shrugging.

It may be harder not to be selected for an SA national team in the current environment. With around 20 established stars have been given time off to count their dollars, recover from injury (Rabada) or contemplate their future (Miller), a shadow national team in Namibia and ‘A’ and ‘Emerging’ teams playing Bangladesh, any remaining professionals between the ages of 23 and 30 would have good cause for doubting their future prospects

One man who won’t be donning any variety of Protea badge, despite his obvious skills, was involved in a thriller of a County Championship match in Cheltenham last week. Gloucestershire were dismissed for just 150 and Worcestershire built a healthy lead of 117. But the home side ‘dug in’ second time around with a gritty 395-7 leaving the visitors a target of 279 at around five runs per over.

20-year-old Cape Town-born Daniel Lategan, who would surely have played for South Africa had he not allied himself to England, compiled an apparently sublime 144 from 163 balls (17x4, 5x6) in an opening stand of 244 with veteran Jake Libby (107*) but, with time running out, an emergency number three was required to finish the job.

Having bowled 32 overs for match figures of 6-91, Beyers Swanepoel strode to the crease at the fall of Lategan’s wicket and belted 22 from 16 balls to drag Worcestershire over the line. Which of the many South African teams might he be playing for now had he not walked off the field in the closing stages of the One Day Cup final last season in order to catch his flight to London?

The Lions, rightly, sacked him on the spot and his future in South Africa looked bleak. But the Titans gave him a lifeline with Chief Executive, Jacques Faul, saying: “He doesn’t deserve to be remembered for making one big mistake.” But also added: “He is exactly the sort of player we need because he is a good all rounder and…he doesn’t play international cricket so he will be available for us.”

It doesn’t require much reading between the lines to see that Swanepoel blew any realistic chance of representing his country when he left his 10 team mates to fend for themselves in the closing stages of that match – which the Titans won by just three wickets with a single ball to spare – and the Lions unable to use a reserve fielder. Why would he do that?

And why would another South African jeopardise his international career by being arrested outside a nightclub at 4:00am with the spotlight shining brighter than ever on player behaviour and alcohol? Eastern Caper, Bryden Carse, was dropped from the England Test squad after the incident in Derby where he was celebrating Durham’s victory which guaranteed them promotion back to Division One of the Championship.

As is so often the case with booze and cricketers, he couldn’t ‘walk away’ from conflict. He stepped outside the late-night drinking den for a smoke and wouldn’t/couldn’t accept the decision of the bouncers not to permit his readmission. He could have messaged his mates: “Bouncer being a jerk, getting Uber, see you at breakfast.” But he didn’t. Like Swanepoel, he didn’t/couldn’t/wouldn’t control his ego.

Fortune is fragile. Some sportsmen don’t appreciate that until it’s gone.