All-rounder Wiaan Mulder has thrown his name into the hat after a fine performance for South Africa against a Sri Lanka Board XI.
Mulder scored 56 off 57 balls, including eight boundaries, and then took 3-12 off 4.1 overs as South Africa bowled the Board XI out for 230 off 44.1 overs, with opener Dimuth Karunaratne scoring 50 to register his fifth half-century in a row against the Proteas. South Africa won by 63 runs after scoring 293 in their innings.
‘For me it was a massive opportunity and if you can stand out it puts your name in the hat for the matches coming up, so I’m just very fortunate that I had a decent day out in the field and hopefully I can take it into the series,’ said Mulder, who has one ODI under his belt for the Proteas.
‘I think the wickets might turn a little bit more than this one did. This one had quite a little bit of pace, especially with the new ball up front, but I do think it was a fair indication of what the wickets are going to play like. For me, it was a fair wicket and a pretty decent wicket to bat on and bowl on.
‘Up front, it was actually quite tough to rotate the strike; their spinners pretty much landed it on a coin every single ball so I had to find a way to score and I was under a little bit of pressure to rotate the strike, but having Reeza [Hendricks] there helped me quite a bit because he got off strike so easily and I took a couple of things from his batting. I enjoyed it and I just tried to stay there as long as I possibly could and, in the end, I played a couple of good shots which gives me a lot of confidence going into the series.
‘For me, it’s always just giving back to the team. It was a good challenge and a good test to see where we are at. The guys who came in had so much energy and that’s what they asked of us, so as a team we’re ready. The sooner the series starts the better for us.’
South Africa 293
F Du Plessis 71, R Hendricks 59, PWA Mulder 56, DA Miller 40
AM Fernando 2-48, KN Peiris 2-47, NGRP Jayasuriya 2-46
Sri Lanka Board XI 230
I Udana 53, FDM Karunaratne 50, DM de Silva 36
PWA Mulder 3-12, T Shamsi 3-41, CJ Dala 2-45,
South Africa won by 63 runs
Photo: Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP/Getty Images
