Johannesburg — With Kane Williamson out injured and Ross Taylor now retired, Devon Conway looms as the major batting threat for New Zealand for the two-match Test series against the Proteas that starts next week.
Once upon a time Conway may have been donning a green cap with a Proteas emblazoned on it, rather than a black one with a silver fern, but his life took a different direction, much to the benefit of the New Zealand team.
Conway has played nine Test innings for his adopted nation, and on five occasions he’s surpassed 50, turning three of those in hundreds, including a double century at Lord’s on debut last year. He made two hundreds in the last two Tests the Kiwis played against Bangladesh. “He’s had a great start to Test cricket - his numbers speak volumes, he’s in a massively purple patch at the moment,” Dean Elgar said on Thursday.
Conway’s journey from the Wanderers to Wellington, is now well known. Despite posting big numbers as a schoolboy and then for the Gauteng Strikers’ semi-professional side, Conway, who matriculated from St John’s in Johannesburg, just couldn’t cut it at franchise level for the Highveld Lions.
Speaking at the time Conway made his debut at Lord’s, his former coach at the Lions, Geoffrey Toyana, told IOL Sport that Conway had put too much pressure on himself to perform which was based on all the publicity he was getting in domestic circles at the time. “From all the people in Gauteng talking about him, to coaches, teachers and other players and then he comes into the Lions dressing room at the time, with those older guys, I think he wanted to impress them and when he didn’t make runs he must have thought to himself, ‘well, what do they think of me, am I good enough?’ He was disappointed, he’d let himself down. It was tough.”
Conway shared the Lions dressing room with Rassi van der Dussen and Temba Bavuma, while Kagiso Rabada was also a familiar face, coming through the ranks as a junior at the time. Elgar, who would have faced Conway on the domestic scene, said there’d be no chirping from the Proteas about the Conway’s decision to take his talents Down Under.
“He’s playing with a different badge on his chest,” said the Proteas captain. “We don’t see him as a South African guy, he is living here, he plays for another country. I’m sure there’ll be some friendly chats off the field with Dev. A lot of guys know him and played with him and against him. Once match day comes and you walk over that white line, it's all about business irrespective of whether he’s your friend.”
From New Zealand’s perspective, Conway’s batting will be crucial to the outcome of the series. Taylor and Williamson are two of their all time great batters, and their absence leaves an enormous hole in the batting order. The selectors recalled Hamish Rutherford, who last played a Test seven years ago, and Daryl Mitchell, who’s played just seven Tests to fill in the gap. But the onus will be on Conway, skipper Tom Latham and Will Young, who made three half centuries against Bangladesh recently, to make the bulk of the runs against a South African attack that is high on confidence.
IOL Sport