Player Profile – Jaydon Brooker (Jeppe Boys)
A talented all-rounder, Jaydon Brooker is captain of the Jeppe High School for Boys’ 1st XI. He’s also widely recognised for his excellence on the hockey field, where he captained Jeppe and Southern Gauteng, and was selected for the South African Schools team after finishing the 2023 Inter-provincial Tournament as its top scorer.
Born and raised in Kimberley, Brooker grew up watching his family play cricket, which is where his love of the game was born. His uncle Finley Brooker appeared in 55 first-class matches for Griqualand West and remains heavily involved in cricket in the province to this day.
Although Jaydon’s passion for the sport blossomed at a young age, at Progress Primary School cricket wasn’t on offer, so he had to play for either CBC Kimberley or West End Primary.
Then, in 2017, he was offered a hockey scholarship to Jeppe High, which boasts one of the richest histories in the sport in South Africa. After careful consideration, he accepted it. Although hockey brought him to Jeppe, he soon proved his worth in cricket, too.
“I made the Jeppe u-14A cricket team, and I was extremely surprised and privileged, but that’s when I knew my journey in cricket had just begun,” Brooker said.
He credits his success and mental toughness to long-time coach, Mike Bechet, an icon of schoolboy sport in South Africa. “He was the one who always backed and supported me, installing a belief in me that I have the abilities to make any side if I believe, commit and work hard for it,” Brooker explained.
His cricket captaincy begins with leading from the front. He bats at three in the Jeppe line-up and usually, also, takes the new ball when his side are in the field.
“I am a right arm medium-fast bowler with not many variations,” he said candidly, “but I can hit any length I desire, especially when it comes to yorkers and death bowling.”
With the bat, Brooker is able to adapt his game to the requirements of the contest, be it taking the attack to the opponents or consolidating and working the ball about to keep the scoreboard ticking.
Questioned about his favourite form of the game, he answered: “I do enjoy all formats but my favourite is 50-over cricket as it can demand both batting with time and increasing the run rate rapidly. It also demands a strong mentality as a cricketer, and it has the potential to humble you very quickly.”
Reflecting on matches that have meant a lot to him, he said: “Beating Helpmekaar in the Johnny Waite final this year has to be one of the greatest memories I’ve made playing for Jeppe. What made it even more special is that we became only the second team in the school’s history to be crowned champions of the tournament.”
He also fondly remembers a win on home turf over Grey College. Batting first, Jeppe put up 194. Then, they bundled out the Bloemfontein boys for just 71 to record a very special 123-run victory.
More recently, at the Oppenheimer Michaelmas Cricket Week in Pietermaritzburg, he struck 78 from 50 balls, with four sixes and four fours, in Jeppe’s 168 for 8 against Glenwood in a T20 clash. Jeppe’s second highest score was just 18.
Brooker’s 78 ended up being more than twice that of Glenwood’s highest scorer as Jeppe scored a hard-fought and nail-biting four-run victory.
He’s hoping the Gauteng selectors have taken note of his all-round contributions and big match temperament, and he hopes those attributes will secure him a place in the squad to contest the Khaya Majola Week in December.
With his mental toughness and all-round ability, coupled with humility, maturity and an extraordinarily high work rate, Jaydon Brooker continues to aim ever higher. Whether his sporting future lies in cricket or hockey remains to be seen, but he wants to take it all the way to pulling on the green and gold.
