There aren’t too many arguments going around against South Africa having the best top-six in the world. The maverick Quinton de Kock, the stable Temba Bavuma, the conventional No. 3 Rassie van der Dussen, and then the dynamic powerhouse trio of Aiden Markram, Heinrich Klaasen and David Miller.
“Yes, maybe they are untested, but Marco, who is almost a batter in his own right, and Gerald’s standing here. If you talk about six-hitting, hopefully you’ll see that soon. And then… we know what KG [Rabada] and Kesh [Keshav Maharaj] can do as well down the order.”
So fancy it enough to spend extra time in the nets working on his batting? “Yeah, no, I definitely want to be a bowling allrounder,” Coetzee said. “If you look at someone like Chris Morris, what value he added, I think there’s a massive gap in the market for that.”
In the 160 balls that Coetzee has faced as a lower-order batter in T20s, he has hit 12 sixes and 11 fours. He is putting in the range-hitting work too. A boundary every eight balls or so is not Chris Morris-level yet, but that is a good aspiration to have for a young allrounder.
Having said all that, as the fireworks in Delhi attested, Jansen and Coetzee at Nos. 7 and 8 inspire enough confidence in the top six to not hold back thinking of a long tail to follow.