Mark Boucher's replacement has been named!

We have all wondered when Mark Boucher will step down as wicket keeper for the Proteas, lately his glove work has become questionable due to errors not seen from the world record holder with 544 dismissals in test cricket. Combined in all formats of international cricket, Mark Boucher is just short of 1000 dismissals and has been a fixture in the Protea squad since 1997.

Thami Tsolekile has been included in the 22 man squad of contracted players for the Proteas. At 31 years old one has to question the wisdom in seeing Tsolekile as the long term replacement for Mark Boucher who was a mere 20 years old when he debuted against Pakistan in 1997.

Finding Boucher's successor has been a complicated business, with Dane Vilas, Heino Kuhn and Daryn Smit all making strong challenges as well, but Tsolekile has seemingly won the race thanks to his no-frills glovework and tenacious batting.

"Thami's been a serious contender for a while, he's 100% as a gloveman plus he's been scoring runs. He made 58 against Australia in November on a difficult pitch and that showed he has some serious ability," Hudson said.

The question is why would CSA look at a player aged 31 to replace a player aged 35, at best you would expect Tsolekile to perhaps play for 3-4 more years.

The contenders

Thami Tsolekile (age 31)
Tests 3
Batting Average 9.4
Dismissals 5
First class matches 130
Dismissals 449
Batting average 29.23
Fifties 23
Centuries 4
In his last five first class matches he scored one fifty.

Dane Vilas (age 26)
First class matches 46
Batting Average 45.29
Dismissals 119
Fifties 12
Centuries 8
In his last five first class matches he has scored 1 big century.

Daryn Smit (age 28)
First class matches 69
Dismissals 208
Batting average 32.04
Fifties 14
Centuries 3
In his last five matches he has scored 2 fifties

Heino Kuhn (age 27)
First class matches 83
Dismissals 274
Batting average 44.04
Fifties 28
Centuries 12
In his last 5 first class matches he has scored 2 fifties and 1 century.

All in all this doesn’t make sense to me, Andrew Hudson convener of selectors said there is a strong possibility that Tsolekile will go to England and should play at least one of the county games, so his report card there will determine his future, but then why already give him a national contract?
Heino Kuhn and Dane Vilas are both a number of years younger than Tsolekile and has a far superior record with the bat. Would it not make sense to expose these two, surely CSA will get double the number of years of service from either of these two.

Nationally contracted squad: Graeme Smith, AB de Villiers, Hashim Amla, Johan Botha, Mark Boucher, JP Duminy, Faf du Plessis, Imran Tahir, Colin Ingram, Jacques Kallis, Albie Morkel, Morne Morkel, Wayne Parnell, Alviro Petersen, Robin Peterson, Vernon Philander, Ashwell Prince, Jacques Rudolph, Dale Steyn, Juan Theron, Thami Tsolekile, Lonwabo Tsotsobe

Would much rather have Kuhn

Well if they are looking at another 30 something they need to forget the guys in their late 20s and also find a group of promising young players who can take on in 3 years time...or just be faced with a conveyor belt of retirees

nothing much wrong with picking a 31-year old keeper if he's your best option. I dislike this idea that you should pick youngsters for the sake of it. At 31 as a keeper you have at least another 4-5 years usually, there's no particular need to pick someone who'll still be around in ten years time IMO.

Having said that, I'm not utterly convinced Tsolekile is indeed the best option. Nowadays keepers need to have decent batting ability (esp. as SA's test team doesn't currently have a bowler capable of batting 7), and Tsolekile looked completely at sea with the bat the last time he played test cricket. Now he may have improved since then, but the stats don't suggest he has any great batting ability. He is a good keeper from what I remember, but as a package he doesn't have enough for me.

From the other options, Kuhn looks the most complete package, while Vilas strikes me more as a batsman made into a keeper. Nothing wrong with that, and Prior (and even Gerraint Jones - though his batting went downhill) have shown that you can become a more than decent keeper quite late in your career, but as of now Kuhn would be the better option IMO. At 27 he's just coming into his prime as a cricketer too.

Could this be a political decision do you think?

Mad, it looks like one. The fact is how do you justify his inclusion at the expense of Kuhn?

Mad for Chelsea wrote:nothing much wrong with picking a 31-year old keeper if he's your best option. I dislike this idea that you should pick youngsters for the sake of it. At 31 as a keeper you have at least another 4-5 years usually, there's no particular need to pick someone who'll still be around in ten years time IMO.

I agree entirely.

Mad for Chelsea wrote:Tsolekile looked completely at sea with the bat the last time he played test cricket.

I agree but then so did Amla in that series. However the point about his first class (batting) record being ordinary (by today's reasonings) is a fair one. He'll need to average at least a couple of runs higher in tests than in domestic cricket. Not unheard of: vaughan, Trescothick, probably others but mostly batsmen; anyone recall a keeper who did better in tests?

I must admit to ignorance as to how he's playing now, or indeed how good any of his competitors are beyond statistics which I don't trust.

Mad for Chelsea wrote:Could this be a political decision do you think?

I think that's what we're all thinking. Shame if so.

Mike apart from one 50 during the recent 5 matches he played in the supersport series he only got one 58 vs Aus, other than that he hasn't been in consistent form, I will admit he is a plucky player, but we need a strong batsman, you look at dhoni and Prior, it is a new age wicket keeper out there.

I'd have gone with Vilas, I think, someone that I have always rated with the bat in particular.

Well I am sure if we had to each out these candidates down from one to four, I am pretty sure none of us would have Tsolekile as our first choice.

Tsolkie has a poor f/c record...

it would surely be out of Vilas or Kuhn...

Is this the same Tsolekile who made his last test match appearance V England in 2004? If it is then surely his selection must be to do with the mad quota selection system.

Yes, same guy. Truth is we have been fortunate over the past number of years that there weren't really any quota players necessary. I know the Sports minister said during last year CSA must find the next black icon. Not sure Tsolekile is the answer though

while I take Mike's point about Amla (my first reaction on seeing him in the test arena was that he'd never cut it at international level as he had far too many weaknesses, but he improved immeasurably from then), it's also true that Tsolekile's first class record doesn't suggest massive improvement. Has it improved over the last couple of years at all?

I really quite like Boucher and think he is often unfairly scapegoated for SA's long tail. His keeping is always good although its true that he made a few errors against Sri Lanka.

I liked the look of Morne van Wyk in the World Cup as a back-up. I'm not that worried about age. At 31 or 32 a player should still have 6-7 years in international cricket which is more than enough if they are the best available option.

I suppose this means Tsolekile will be back up in the Test squads to NZ and England then though, as otherwise it would trivialise the whole contract system.

I've always rated Boucher too, but age has caught up with him, and his reflexes have slowed. If you watch carefully the SL series, he's "lost a step" with his keeping. This essentially forces him to anticipate that bit more (something you want to avoid doing as a keeper) and resulted in him being wrong-footed on a few occasions.

It happens to all of them when they get a bit older, I remember seeing it with Gilchrist in the 06-07 Ashes, it certainly happened to Stewart at the end of his career, and there were signs against India that it's happening to Haddin as well.

For those who follow tennis, a similar thing has happened with Federer, resulting in him missing a few more shots (less precise footwork) and also not being as strong on the return of serve as he used to.

Very disappointing that Heino continues to be over looked. Sure Thami is a slightly better keeper, but Heino would be termed an all rounder.

Hopefully when AB becomes Test captain, he'll get his Titans team-mate(Heino) a well over due Test cap!

It would seem too late Demon, as Tsolekile has already been contracted, unless it is a token contract such as Sepaka recieved from SARU when they paid him R1 million for a year in which he was never selected.

biltongbek wrote:It would seem too late Demon, as Tsolekile has already been contracted, unless it is a token contract such as Sepaka recieved from SARU when they paid him R1 million for a year in which he was never selected.

I hoping its a smokescreen Biltong. Has to be noted, soon as AB become ODI skipper, Albie gained a recall