SA20 has had more peaks than valleys after a superb season three

9 Feb 2025

This season of the increasingly popular SA20 was not without its hiccups, but the highs have outshone the lows and the crowds loved it.

The longer the SA20 premier cricket league continues to grow, the more narratives and rivalries will begin to emerge organically. In three seasons they have already begun to sprout.

SA20’s world-class marketing department has played no small role in this and has capitalised on it too. As a result, the tournament has captured the attention of the sport-loving nation and crowds have poured into stadiums across the country, from the Bullring in Johannesburg to the quainter Boland Park in Paarl. More than a third of the matches were sold out this season.

“The SA20 has been an unbelievable addition to this country and South African cricket,” Paarl Royals skipper David Miller said.

“Playing in front of the crowds that we do and the support all the teams get around the country is truly amazing. It’s a great privilege to be playing in front of those big crowds and having the atmosphere that we do.”

Miller has played franchise or domestic T20 cricket for 27 different sides all over the globe. Praise for the success of the tournament from this big-hitting southpaw carries serious weight.

“Credit has to go to [league commissioner] Graeme Smith and his team,” Miller said. “They’ve been really good with putting it all together and marketing it very well.

“It’s an incredible package, the entire brand. It’s become a well-known tournament around the world... It’s great to be a part of it and I really do think it’s going to go a long way for many years to come.”

This season’s final was sold out two weeks before the date, with no confirmation of who would be in it. That has been made possible because all four play-off matches are determined before the start of the tournament.

It makes planning easy for spectators, but it does mean that the final is often played at a neutral venue. In the opening two seasons of the SA20, in which the Sunrisers Eastern Cape were crowned champions, both finals’ venues – Wanderers and Newlands – were neutral for all the competing sides.

Tuesday’s qualifier between the two best sides in this year’s SA20, MI Cape Town and Paarl Royals, only had a smattering of a crowd at St George’s Park in Gqeberha because their home side, Sunrisers, were not involved.

This season, the stadium was filled to the brim on match days involving the Sunrisers. Decked out in orange regalia, a united sea of spectators sang in unison alongside their famous band.

The qualifier, however, had a much more subdued atmosphere in comparison, which would not have been the case had it been hosted in either Paarl or Cape Town.

Future scheduling

The next three seasons of the SA20 have been outlined in the calendar already. The next season starts on Boxing Day this year because South Africa has no home Test matches scheduled for that period.

This means that South Africa’s main sporting attraction will be the SA20 next summer. It has also been moved forward so as not to clash with the next T20 World Cup, hosted by India and Sri Lanka, which is scheduled to take place from February 2026.

The scheduling of the SA20 has not been ideal for the national team thus far. In season two, the Proteas basically forfeited a Test series to New Zealand by sending a depleted side there because all the contracted SA20 players stayed behind. They had to fulfil their contracts and not compromise the burgeoning tournament.

This year, South Africa’s first match of a 50-over tri-series against New Zealand and Pakistan, which serves as a warm-up for the Champions Trophy, falls on the day of the SA20 final, 8 February.

This means Champions Trophy squad members Marco Jansen, Aiden Markram, David Miller, Kagiso Rabada, Ryan Rickelton, Tristan Stubbs, and Rassie van der Dussen – whose sides were in the running for the SA20 trophy in the final week – will miss the tri-series.

Instead, a young, inexperienced, 12-player Proteas squad, which includes six uncapped one-day international players, will compete for national pride in Lahore.

These are some of the growing pains the SA20 continues to go through as it tries to establish itself as the second-best franchise T20 tournament in the world, right behind the Indian Premier League.

Young talent

On the field, the quality of cricket has been hot and cold. Joe Root of the Paarl Royals and Kane Williamson of Durban’s Super Giants have brought a noticeable increase in high-quality batting to their respective sides.

The two global superstar batters, better known for their exploits in red-ball cricket, have shown the gulf in class between themselves and other international batters, who have struggled on South African shores throughout the season.

Apart from Williamson and Root, New Zealand international player Devon Conway, who learnt his craft on the Highveld playing for the Lions, is the only overseas batter in the top 10 (ranked ninth) run scorers this season – and his runs came at a lowly strike rate of 110.

Tom Abell, Zak Crawley, Brandon King, Sam Hain, Rahmanullah Gurbaz and even India’s first cricketer to play in the SA20, Dinesh Karthik, all blew cold more often than hot.

On the bowling front, the overseas tweakers and slingers have been a class above. Five of the top 10 wicket takers are not local players. Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Noor Ahmad, Richard Gleeson, Rashid Khan and Liam Dawson did the most damage with the ball.

South Africa’s young talent has also had an opportunity to shine. Opener Lhuan-dre Pretorius (18) caught the most time in the sun with his elegant handling of the bat. He has hovered among the leading run scorers throughout the season and an international cap can’t be too far away for the talented stroke-maker.

After much hype early in his career, Dewald Brevis has also started to make good on his potential this season with a few dominating showings with the willow, as well as showing potential with his legspin bowling.

Connor Esterhuizen and young Kwena Maphaka have also shown their potential at this level, but without much consistency. However, that these youngsters regularly get to rub shoulders with some of the best players in the world and thus continually improve their play means the tournament is doing what it set out to do. DM

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R35.

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Future scheduling

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