LONDON — South Africa captain
Dean Elgar
said on Tuesday he was fed up with discussing England’s new swashbuckling
“Bazball” approach to Test cricket on the eve of their series opener at Lord’s.
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England have won all four of their Tests under a new
leadership pairing of skipper Ben Stokes and coach Brendon McCullum.
McCullum’s nickname is behind “Bazball” tag that has
become shorthand for an aggressive style of playing the five-day game.
That 100 percent record includes a 3–0 series sweep
over world champions New Zealand, with England hunting down challenging targets
on each occasion.
Stokes’s men then made light of a seemingly stiff
target of 378 in the COVID-delayed fifth Test against India at Edgbaston,
romping to victory by seven wickets.
But South Africa — top of the
World Test Championship table — will be a tough proposition for England in the three-match
series starting on Wednesday.
Opening batsman Elgar is confident the Proteas’ pace
attack can cut high-flying England down to size.
“With all due respect I am really not going to
entertain that (Bazball) anymore,” Elgar said at Lord’s on Tuesday.
“We have chatted about it long and hard. I just want
to crack on with the cricket. I think the game deserves that respect and
mud-slinging is now a thing of the past for me.”
Elgar, who has overseen seven wins from nine matches
since becoming South Africa’s permanent red-ball skipper, accepts there may be
times when the tourists are on the defensive but he believes they have the
resources to fight back.
“I would like to think from a bowling point of view,
our bowlers are big, tall, fast and strong buggers and we have ticked the boxes
in regards to the spin department.”
Elgar tried to put England’s run-chases into
perspective by saying the conditions in those matches were “pretty nice” for
batting.
But he did not underestimate the scale of the
tourists’ task.
“It might be hard work for us but this is what we
are here to do,” he said. “We are not here to play soft-natured cricket. We
want it hard and really tough and hopefully the results go our way.”
South Africa conceded a mammoth 672 runs during an
innings defeat by the second-string England Lions at Canterbury last week but
an unconcerned Elgar said he read nothing into the warm-up game.
“If they come out playing like that in an official
Test match and it goes pear-shaped, that will not look very good for England.”
Stokes, who gave his pre-match press conference at
Lord’s before Elgar, said he was happy to hear the South Africans talk about
England’s new attacking approach.
“The opposition seem to be doing a lot of talking
about it (Bazball) at the moment — we don’t really speak about it that much,”
he said.
“We don’t dive into it too much, but I’m happy for
Dean and the South Africa team to say they’re not interested and then keep
talking about it,” the all-rounder added.
“We’ve got a style of play, they’ve got a style of
play. At the end of the day it’s bat against ball and whoever plays best over a
Test match is more than likely to win.”
England have made just one change to the team that
beat India in the postponed Test last month, recalling fit-again wicketkeeper
Ben Foakes following a bout of COVID-19 in place of stand-in gloveman Sam
Billings.
“Foakesy is the best wicketkeeper in the world,”
said Stokes. “To have world-class quality behind the stumps is almost like a
pillow, knowing that you’ve got someone with his skill level behind there.”
South Africa still have a doubt over fast bowler
Kagiso Rabada, who has been struggling with an ankle injury.
“I think KG (Rabada) is very close to being fully fit for
this Test,” said Elgar. “He has had a really good few days so it is looking
pretty good for us.”
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