Player Profile – Ross Coetzee (Kearsney College)
The Dolphins named Ross Coetzee their captain for the forthcoming Khaya Majola Week. The Kearsney College captain enjoyed a spectacular and record-breaking year with the bat. He has been a part of the Dolphins’ set-up from u11 and has represented the province through all the age groups. He played in the 2023 Khaya Majola Week and was picked for the Cubs Week at the beginning of the year.
Coetzee boasts a track record of lifting silverware with the sides he leads. He has a bright future in the game and hopes to represent his country in the future.
“Ross is a thinker of the game and understands what needs to be done, and, most importantly for him, it’s about the team winning the game, so he must bat for them,” Duzi Mbatha, the Dolphins’ assistant coach said.
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A thin layer of fibreglass tape close to the toe-end of his bat tells you that Ross Coetzee has used it as a digging tool to repel yorkers. The face of the blade is blood red. It’s as if Coetzee tried his hand at painting on it, targeting the middle to lower part of his bat.
However, Coetzee is no painter. He prefers fishing over wielding a paintbrush. The red region on his bat is evidence of the thousands of balls Coetzee has middled while decimating bowling attacks.
On 12 October 2024, Coetzee unknowingly recreated Walter Crane’s illustration of a young King Arthur holding up the Excalibur. The young man stood in the middle of the pitch, facing his team’s dugout, his battle-worn bat in one hand and helmet in the other. Like King Arthur, Coetzee had vanquished the opposition on his way to a century in his 100th first-team match for Kearsney College.
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If one considers underarm bowling and gentle half-trackers as coaching, Coetzee’s first coach was his father, Lourens. The older Coetzee has no cricket background and possesses only a fan’s understanding of the game. Nonetheless, Lourens threw hundreds of balls after work, on weekends, and during holidays to his son.
“How do you decide that you are not going to have a weekend? Ross loves cricket so much that he plays on Saturday and Sunday. He has always been like this. As a child, he just wanted me to throw balls at him all the time,” Lourens recalled.
Those moments are imprinted on Ross Coetzee’s mind. “I remember when my dad was throwing balls to me, and I was hitting them with the baseball bat.”
Lourens’ dedication and their backyard did not meet Coetzee’s needs as a budding cricketer. The father quickly realised that his son required more and went to a local indoor cricket centre and asked if they could join it.
Instead of being buried by the wave of talent he encountered, Coetzee thrived in his new surroundings. Playing in a stream of talented and driven youngsters fed into his desire to excel. He rode the wave. In 2018, he was selected for the title-winning South Africa u13 indoor team that defeated Australia in the Indoor Cricket World Cup final in Christchurch, New Zealand.
That team’s triumph marked the first time that Australia had been beaten at u13 level. Coetzee and company became the first South African team to be crowned world champions of indoor cricket. That side included Lhuan-Dre Pretorius and 2023 Kearsney College captain Hayden Bishop. However, having some of the most talented youngsters of his generation in that line-up didn’t mean that Coetzee rode his teammates’ coattails. He did so well that he was voted the third most valuable player of the tournament.
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There was a touch of Barry Richards in the manner in which Coetzee was going about business. The legendary Durbanite was like a video game that had two modes: easy and expert.
The easy mode was like the autopilot version of Richards, which he engaged when facing lesser bowling attacks. He switched on to expert when up against the best bowlers of his time. He was hard to dismiss in either mode.
Despite conditions being different from what Coetzee was used to, none of the bowlers he faced could dismiss him. They were playing cricket in a park in India. The pitch was devoid of any grass. It was completely bare. Instead of a regular cricket ball, they were using a heavier tennis ball. The Bengaluru temperatures were also higher than he was accustomed to in Durban.
If those differences were not enough, there were also 10 other matches taking place around his. The constant action and noise were enough to distract any batsman. Coetzee, though, was locked in easy mode during the early part of his knock., However, he had to engage expert mode as better bowlers gravitated to his side’s pitch. Word had gotten around that no one could dismiss him.
Lourens took his son to India because he felt that Coetzee needed to experience cricket in one of the biggest cricketing nations in the world. However, park cricket was not their raison d’etre in Bengaluru. Coetzee was a member of the Carter Cricket Academy team that was on tour to the subcontinental nation for an eight-team tournament.
The teams competed in two T20 and seven 50-over contests. As he did with the u13 side, Coetzee led his team to the title.
“Ross is a special player,” Sam Mofokeng, the Dolphins’ u19 coach stated.
Mofokeng’s assessment is not based on Coetzee’s trip to India. The Dolphins’ coach didn’t watch that series of matches. However, he is aware of what the Kearsney learner has been doing on the local scene. In March 2022, Coetzee was adjudged to be the Dolphins Castle Corner Bash’s Youth Player of the Tournament. The showpiece features Hollywoodbets Dolphins’ professionals, Dolphins Academy players, top club players, and a select number of school boys.
A highlight was when Coetzee carved an unbeaten 37-ball 65 against a bowling attack that featured Prenelan Subrayen and Jason Smith to help his side to victory. “It was amazing to test myself against the pros and it was really cool batting with Jon-Jon Smuts, Robbie Frylink, and Slade van Staden. Jon-Jon gave me some great advice with my batting options and scoring areas, especially against left-arm spin,” Coetzee said.
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“Ross is one of the most complete batters I have come across. He has an excellent technique that he can rely on but his greatest strength is his explosiveness. He can destroy a bowling attack when he wants to. He is very innovative and is the complete 360-degree batter,” Matt Savage, Coetzee’s coach at Kearsney, shared.
That view is also shared by Mofokeng and Duzi Mbatha. And that is not the highest compliment that trio of coaches has paid Coetzee. The three gaffers agree that Coetzee’s greatest attribute is his coachability.
“When I first saw him, he was that kid who was constantly asking questions. He asked coaches and professional players. He hasn’t changed. He has a hunger to learn and improve,” Mofokeng explained.
When Mofokeng gave Coetzee his Dolphins Colts debut, the youngster didn’t score many runs. Instead of brooding and sulking in the dugout, Coetzee quickly removed his pads, went to sit beside his coach, and, almost immediately, asked the mentor to show him what he had done wrong.
“I have seen a lot of youngsters come through, and most of the highly talented are not coachable. This is what makes Ross stand out. It’s almost as if he doesn’t realise how talented he is,” Mofokeng said.
Coetzee’s hunger to grow and develop is the reason why he is Kearsney’s all-time leading run-scorer for the first team in a calendar year, with 1 463 runs at an average of 63.6 in 2024. He surpassed the record set by his long-time friend Hayden Bishop, who made 1 428 runs last year.
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Cricket is a sport with a high failure rate. Most batsmen fail more than they succeed, and so do bowlers. Most of them fail in landmark innings. A handful chalk up outstanding performances in milestone matches. However, for Coetzee, dedication and years of learning from failure culminated in him registering a century in his 100th match for the Kearsney 1st XI.
“There was a matric thing for our grade on the Friday before my 100th match, but I didn’t go because I wanted to have the best chance the Saturday for my game,” Coetzee shared.
Hilton College batted first, and Kearsney was in the match for most of the contest. However, Kearsney collectively felt a sense of dread as Hilton creamed 100 runs in the last seven overs of their innings.
“I remember saying to Mr Savage that all Hilton’s late surge means is there are more runs to score,” Coetzee recalled.
In the middle, he drove like Kohli, smashed spin like Heinrich Klaasen, employed Chris Gayle’s hitting and striking ability, and engaged AB de Villiers’ 360 batting as he motored to an incredible ton, on his way to leading his team to victory. He embodied his cricket heroes as he went about his business. It was fitting that he did so with his favourite bat.
“Yousuf, from KH, gave it to me because they noticed that it had a hole in the side after it came through customs. The hole made it unsellable and he gave it to me for free,” said Coetzee.
He used it in the nets for a while before he promoted it to club and school matches. Coetzee has scored a lot of runs with it. It is as if the bat was made for him, just like King Arthur and the Excalibur.
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