Boucher looking for a hard edge to his Proteas

The extended South African squad met for a culture camp recently where they hashed out a number of different issues and as a team put together a new way forward for the squad. Apart from this new cultural direction, Boucher and the side addressed a way forward on the pitch too.

“It’s all about performance and that’s key for me,” Boucher said. 

“We don’t want to be a nice group of guys and be eighth in the world. I’d rather be a challenging group of guys and be competing for the number one spot and they all want that as well which is great to hear. 

“We’re all aligned in the right direction, and although it’s all still words, we still need to go out there and try and live it, rather than have it be words coming out of our mouths. I’m happy that the players are happy, but now the hard work starts.”

After such a long period away from competitive cricket, Boucher is hoping that all cricketers in the country can get back to playing as soon as possible.

“We want to get on the field and start playing. It’s been a long break; I don’t think the players have had this long a break since school days. Although they’ve been practicing, you (the coach) want to put that practice into match experience. 

“A few guys have moved over to the IPL, so they’ll be happy that they’ll get some game time.”

The Proteas have seen their rankings in both test cricket and limited overs cricket drop to sixth in red ball cricket and fifth in both white ball formats. Boucher believes that the players in the mix will succeed if they buy in and execute their plans.

“My biggest hope for the national team when we do get back to playing again is that we really drive the vision that they’ve (the players) put out for themselves. I do believe that we’ve got the talent to do that and if we play in that sort of way, I have no doubt that there’s going to be success.

“We’re going to make some mistakes – we’re a young team – but as long as we keep learning from those mistakes, we will become a better unit. The players are keen to try something different in order to get different results, especially when we go to big tournaments.”

As the Proteas still search for a permanent test captain, the role has been discussed but nothing will be finalised until there is a new convenor of selectors. Despite Quinton de Kock taking over the role in a limited overs capacity, Boucher has ruled him out of taking over the test captaincy.

“I think Quinny’s (Quinton de Kock) workload is pretty high. He showed good results in the T20s and the One-Dayers that he’s taken over. 

“The last conversation I had with Quinny around this topic was in India where he felt that the workload was going to be a little high for him. Whoever is the captain will probably use Quinny’s brain to good effect as a keeper, you see things from probably the best angle. 

“I’m sure he’ll add a lot of value just being Quinton de Kock within the Test team,” Boucher concluded.