The former South African speedster, Dale Steyn is ready to work with some of England’s finest young fast bowlers as he begins his coaching stint next month with the South Africa-bound team. His stint comes under Andrew Flintoff’s coaching staff with the England Lions, where he will join former teammate Neil McKenzie.
Role Of Steyn In The England Lions
Steyn, who took 439 Test wickets for South Africa in an impressive career, will be with the Lions on a short-term basis. The ECB recently announced a 19-man training squad for the month. The tour will run between November 20 and December 14, as a large proportion of this will be a training camp, with the final phase being a four-day game against South Africa A in Western Province.
Focus On Fast Bowlers
The team has a strong representation of seamers with ten fast bowlers in the team. More international cap holders are also seen in the side: Pat Brown and Josh Hull were deemed to be included as fully capped players. Some of the unused squad members for this summer include Dillon Pennington and John Turner. Other fast bowlers include Zaman Akhtar, Kasey Aldridge, Henry Crocombe, Tom Lawes, Harry Moore, and Mitchell Stanley.
He feels the seam-laden team catches “England’s short and long-term needs” across all formats. “It is fantastic to see over half of the squad is seamers, which justifies our commitment, in progress, toward fully developing the seamers,” he said.
McKenzie’s Leadership
Former South African batsman Neil McKenzie will be among the batters, but they will be joined by three relatively new faces from the England Under-19 setup. Freddie McCann, Ben McKinney, and Hamza Sheikh join the fray, along with Dan Mousley, who has played for the Lions, having toured the Caribbean with England as part of their white-ball series. James Coles, Matty Hurst, and James Rew make up the rest.
McKenzie has been linked with the erstwhile head coach of Northern Superchargers in the Hundred, Flintoff. He also was the associate coach of the national side of South Africa as well as the Desert Vipers. He has recently lost out on a batting coach’s position to Dinesh Karthik to be the official batting coach of Royal Challengers Bengaluru.
Probable Future Expectations As A Coach
Karthik also spent a short stint this year as part of the Lions coaching staff in India, a development tour component of efforts at the ECB to utilize local expertise. Jacques Kallis is likely to be the South Africa camp coach, but he may not be included in the final list when the England board announces their staff later this week.
