South Africa batter reveals he worked on playing the ball late to improve his game
Kyle Verne is one of only a handful of batsmen in South Africa's first-class landscape to maintain a career average of 50 since his 2015 debut, but with loads of numbers behind him, he has hesitantly entered the international stage. logging in. After eight Test innings with an average of 14, it turned into serious uncertainty.
"It's been very challenging mentally. Test cricket is the toughest format of the game and my first pair of starts in the West Indies was on very challenging wickets," said Wren after scoring an unbeaten 136 on Monday. "Against India, it was probably the toughest pitch I played on and then coming here, in the first Test, the wicket was tough enough to even bat on. Mentally, you have a lot of doubts about yourself. You've done a lot of things. Educated people are writing. A lot of questions were being asked about me technically."
At the top of the list of questions about Wren was whether, before his innings in the second Test against New Zealand, he shrugged off the aggressive approach that had made his name in the domestic circuit, and whether he should be using his legs more. . He spent the final week addressing both of those concerns and felt that his more tentative approach was a response to slower surfaces in the Caribbean and that he needed to adjust back to playing on surfaces with speed and bounce. "When we were in the West Indies, I tried to change my technique to adjust to those conditions. When we came back to South Africa, I never went back to how I was batting earlier," he said. "I felt in the West Indies, those adjustments were important but I had forgotten the importance of working beforehand. So I made some little things with my trigger movement."
He's still not convinced he needs to move his legs any more and instead wants to play the ball as late as possible. "Footwork has never been a strong point of mine. It's more about the contact points," he said. "It's something I'm working on a lot. Footwork isn't always the most important thing, it's more that I'm playing the ball late."
Well-timed and his array of draws and cuts were examples of how Wren changed his approach to play the ball under his eyes and at almost the last possible second. And he also found the pace for which he was known in local circles - this morning he scored only two runs in the first 10 balls, he scored 24 runs in the next 25. His first half-century came in 98 balls and the second half-century. 61 and his partnership with Kagiso Rabada, who scored 47 off 34 balls, came in at 7.42 till the over.
While Wren allowed South Africa to bat longer and deeper, Rabada's knock changed the tone of the innings and put South Africa on the field.
"With KG, there was no plan for him to come out and play the way he did, but he said he was feeling great," said Wren. "He told me he would stay with me till I hit my century but once he started hitting it, I told him to just keep going because it looked like he couldn't miss it. Which The way he played was one of the big factors in the energy we took into our bowling. What he was able to do, he gave everyone a little bit of energy. It was good to see."
Rabada left Vereen for 95 and it was Keshav Maharaj with whom he celebrated his century. While it may have been an innings that defined the early stages of his international career, Vereen said he didn't feel he was in danger of being benched if he didn't get three figures in this series. "I didn't feel like I was batting for my place," he said. "I just felt proud. I've worked my whole life to play Test cricket. To cross the line and contribute is something I'm really proud of. When I crossed the mark, it's pride and joy There was a feeling that I made a big impact on the way forward for an outcome."
He rejected any comparisons to his predecessor Quinton de Kock, who retired from Test cricket at the end of 2021, creating an opportunity for Vereen to have a longer run in the XI. "I was never made to feel that I was replacing Quinney. His retirement was a shock to all of us, but from the next day on, I found support and support that this is my place," said Wren. "He's had a great Test career and he's been very successful, so I understand there are expectations to live up to what he's done. I've been lucky to have the support. I have the time and all I need is mine. Be yours."
Six Tests into his career, Vereen is already paying off the trust the coaching staff has shown in him. His century could become part of a historic win and an unbroken streak of never losing a Test series to New Zealand, something that seemed impossible after their massive defeat in the first Test. "Things didn't go according to plan. Everyone knows that," Wren said. "But before that, we beat India 2-1, so within the team, there was no doubt about what we were capable of. We looked at the first Test as one of those things. Sometimes that Happens in the game where everything falls apart, which he did in the first Test."