Pace duo ready to spearhead SA charge

As soon as he saw Kagiso Rabada, Dale Steyn knew. “You could just watch him bowl one ball, how he was running in, how easy his action was; he made it look simple.”

It was 2014, the Under 19 Cricket World Cup, and Rabada was en route to 14 wickets that led South Africa to victory. Steyn, watching from home, took note. “He stood out head and shoulders above everybody else,” he says.

Twelve months later Steyn was left flat on his back, staring in disbelief into a starry Antipodean sky, another ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup semifinal having slipped from South Africa’s grasp. Rabada joined the team later that year and, since becoming his teammate, Steyn’s admiration for ‘KG’ has only grown.

“He’s a natural athlete,” the 35-year-old enthuses. “He could be a basketball player, he could be a sprinter, he could be anything. And when you put a cricket ball in his hand you quickly realise that this is what he was put on earth to do. It’s amazing. You don’t have to teach him anything, it just comes naturally to him.” There is a touch of awe in his voice. “There’s not much more you can say about it. He’s just got it all.”

Coming from South Africa’s leading Test wicket-taker, and the man who has spent more time at the top of the MRF Tyres ICC Test Bowling Rankings than any other, it’s dizzying praise. And the feeling is mutual. “Dale’s action is so simple and uncomplicated,” says Rabada, 11 years Steyn’s junior. “When you’re around quality like that, you just watch.”

Watching has served Rabada well. The 24-year-old already has 106 ODI wicket and faint whispers he might become South Africa’s greatest bowler are abound. But Steyn waves them aside as meaningless. How can we judge ‘greatest ever’, he asks? Using stats? “That’s boring,” he says. “We play in a different time to players who played in the past. Right now he’s killing people.”