'We need to be proactive’ – Junior Dala
Junior Dala has had an interesting start to his international career.
On a loud afternoon at the Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg, Dala failed to spot nicks off both Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan off his own bowling. South Africa reviewed the first, and got a decision in their favour, but everyone missed the second one – the short ball grazing the gloves on its way to Heinrich Klaasen behind the stumps and being called a wide.
Dhawan went on to score a 39-ball 72 as India won by 28 runs to take a 1-0 lead in the three-match Twenty20 International series, and while Dala added Suresh Raina’s wicket to his kitty, he gave away 47 runs from his four overs, making it the most expensive spell by a South African on T20I debut.
“I was quite a bit nervous. I was glad that … I don't even bowl in the Powerplay for the Titans. For me to open the bowling was something new and I was glad that I could control the ball. Maybe adrenaline got a little bit too much for me at stages. Overall, I could have done better, but pleased that I got a few wickets also. So not too bad,” said Dala a day before the second game, which will be played in Centurion on Wednesday, 21 February.
Elaborating on the two nicks, Dala, 28, said, “I watched the highlights. With the way Shikhar played that pull shot, where the gloves were I couldn’t … my sight was blinded. So when the umpire called the wide, I sort of went with the call. I couldn't really see the ball from where I delivered the ball. Again in hindsight, had I appealed there, it’s a different story. They would be 50 or 40 for three and under a lot of pressure.
“A little bit of adrenaline. It was probably the biggest crowd … it was very noisy. So I genuinely didn't hear that (nick from Rohit). Thankfully Klassy (Klaasen) behind the stumps was alert to that.”
With many of the regular players injured or rested for the series, the South Africans have turned to a relatively inexperienced bunch, Dala one of them. Bowling a lot of short deliveries, Dala gave away 36 runs in his first three overs, all in the Powerplay, which India ended on 78/2.
“Obviously, when you play T20 cricket, you have to assess the wickets very early on. We sort of had a game plan, and we sort of stuck to it. In terms of our game plan, we backed it. Whether it was wrong or right, it’s something we truly believed in. With any game plan, if you don’t execute it, it always looks a bit bad,” said Dala of his line of attack.
“As bowlers, the one thing after the game is that we were honest with each other. It was down to execution. We need to be more proactive, as opposed to reactive, and not be predictable. That’s the only thing that I would probably change.”
South Africa did pull things back to keep India to 203/5, but the task was still too much for their batsmen. “Apart from that first six overs, outside the Powerplay, if we can just sharpen up and restrict the run rate down between overs seven and 11, that will put us in good stead,” offered Dala. “We will take a lot of confidence in the fact that India looked like they were going to score about 240 and to restrict them to 200, that actually gave the batting unit quite a bit of confidence to chase that score on that wicket.”
Dala was selected, in the absence of most of the frontline pacers, after impressive performances at the domestic level and for South Africa A, but has been laid low at various stages of his career – he made his first-class debut in December 2011 – because of injuries.
“It means the most to me, because after that SA A tour (against India at home in 2017), I thought I had a very good SA A tour and I felt I was a few franchise performances away from cracking … after that SA A tour, just with the injuries and all of that I just, I’m glad that I could come back. I was just pleased that I can overcome injury and still be play at my best when I do play,” he said.
Stressing that it was about “communication” among the players and “execution” of the game plans, Dala hoped that things could be turned around in the second game.
“India’s played very good cricket. Had we bowled the way we did and won on Sunday, we’d still be having the same conversation,” he said. “We are not too far away. We can turn this around tomorrow and if we win on Sunday, everyone will say it was actually a good tour for South Africa, we won the tour 2-1.”