Kepler Wessels
Kepler Christoffel Wessels is a South African-Australian cricket commentator and former cricketer who captained South Africa after playing 24 Tests for Australia. Since retiring he has been a lawn bowls competitor.
He was a left-handed opening batsman. He played first-class cricket for Orange Free State, Western Province, Northern Transvaal, Eastern Province and Griqualand West in South Africa, for Queensland in Australia and Sussex in England. In 2008, he coached the Indian Premier League franchise Chennai Super Kings and later returned to coaching in South Africa.
Early years
Wessels was six years old when he was introduced to the game of cricket. Volsteedt taught him the basics of the game and began to regularly play cricket with him during Sunday visits to the Wessels household. A few years later, Volsteedt became the master in charge of cricket at Grey College, Bloemfontein, and coached Wessels during his playing days for the school's first team.From a very early age, Wessels showed exceptional sporting talent. By the age of 12, he was playing rugby union for the Free State primary schools team and he was one of the leading schoolboy swimmers in the province. However, after a close encounter with death, due to nephritis, Kepler's father decided that his son would no longer be allowed to participate in swimming.
Wessels decided to switch to cricket, even though the rules of Grey College did not allow him to play at such a young age. With the help of Johan Volsteedt, Wessels was allowed to participate in the net practices and soon cricket became his main activity during summer. During winter, he played tennis, at which he won so frequently that, by 1973, he was the number 1 under-16 player in South Africa and was offered a scholarship of $25 000 over four years from the University of Houston. However, due to the fact that he played as an under-16 against adults, Wessels began to lose regularly in senior tournaments. After a dramatic loss during the Griqualand West Open in Kimberley – after which he cut all the strings from his racket in the changing room – Wessels turned down the offer from Houston and decided to focus all his attention on cricket.
As a young cricket player, Wessels scored his first century at the age of nine and was taken into the Free State under-13 side during the same year, getting scores of 80, 80, 88 and 121 against players four years his senior. By the end of 1969, his batting average for Grey College was 259.59. He was selected to represent the Free State schools side at the prestigious Nuffield Week for five consecutive seasons; and was selected three times for the South African schools side, the third season as captain.
Wessels finished his high school cricket career with an innings of 130 not out, during a home game for Grey College, against rival Queen's College from the Eastern Cape. His superb innings laid the foundation for Grey's first victory over Queen's in 18 years.
He played his first first-class match at the age of 16, batting at number nine and making 32 for Orange Free State in a team captained by the Test veteran Colin Bland. At 18 he was playing professionally in England, opening the batting for Sussex.
World Series Cricket
In the late 1970s, Wessels was drafted by Kerry Packer to play for the Australian World Series Cricket Team. As a South African with little hope of playing Test cricket for his country, Wessels joined the "circus" to take advantage of the better pay and conditions that the WSC offered.He arrived in Sydney at the age of 21 and was put on trial at the local Waverley club, for Packer to see first if Wessels was decent material for World Series Cricket. After scoring 123 against Penrith, newspapers started speculating about a place for Wessels in the New South Wales state side. The media was unaware that Wessels had already signed for Packer. An innings of 137 followed against the Sydney club side and the selectors immediately named him in the state training squad. That was the signal Packer needed and he quickly called a press conference to announce that Wessels would be playing World Series Cricket instead.
Packer saw in Wessels a reliable opening batsman – something that the Australian WSC side was in serious need of. To help him find his feet in the new environment, Wessels played a couple of games for the second-string Cavaliers side. During his first game, two short balls had struck him in the ribs and on the chest, and in both cases, he refused to leave the field and battled on to score a 54 from the innings.
Finally, Wessels was included in the Australian XI, for a one-day game against the WSC World XI, which included four fellow South Africans. He scored 20, made 21 in the next game and then got 92 against the Cavaliers side. A Supertest against a 'Rest of the World' side followed in Melbourne, but Wessels scored only eight in the first innings. In the second innings, he managed to get to 46. He regained some respect, however, during the next Supertest against the WSC West Indies, by scoring 126 in his first innings. During the Supertest final between Australia and the World XI, Wessels scored 27 in his first innings, but experienced a miserable second one. Australia lost by five wickets.
The one-day series involved a best-of-five final between Australia and the West Indies and Wessels scored an unbeaten 136 during the first match which was the only century in the WSC International Cup, during one of the finest one-day innings of his career. He scored 40 and 70 from the next two games respectively, after which the West Indies led the series 2–1. They won the series during the fourth match, thanks to a better run-rate, when Australia couldn't finish bowling their 50 overs by the scheduled end of the match at 10:30 p. m.
A third leg to the World Series was due to be played in the West Indies, but Wessels was forced to stay behind, because he still held a South African passport and would not be granted visas for the Caribbean. It was the end of his World Series Cricket experience, as Packer reached a settlement with the Australian Cricket Board in 1979. The World Series was disbanded after that.
Australian international career
1982/83 England tour of Australia – debut
Wessels stayed in Australia to qualify for the Australian Test side, playing for Queensland, and made his debut against England at The Gabba in Brisbane on 26 November 1982. He became the first South-African born person to play for Australia, and the 13th Australian player to score a century on debut. Wessels dominated the English bowling, with scores of 162 in the first innings and 46 in the second. He was instrumental in Australia's victory by seven wickets and was given the "Man of the Match" award. He eventually played four Tests in his debut series and scored 386 runs at an average of 48.25.1982/83 Australian tour of Sri Lanka
In April 1983, Australia played their inaugural Test match against Sri Lanka. Wessels continued his good form with 141, thus becoming the first overseas player to score a century in Sri Lanka. He was named "man of the match" in Australia's innings victory.1983 World Cup
Wessels also played in the 1983 World Cup. He made 76 against Zimbabwe but it was not enough to save Australia from defeat. After failing against West Indies and India, he was dropped from the side.1983/84 Pakistan tour of Australia
Wessels played in each of the five Tests against Pakistan, scoring 256 runs at an average of 42.66. This included 179 in the third Test, which remained his top score. Despite this moderately good form, Wessels was outscored by five other Australian players who took advantage of the poor quality Pakistan bowling.Greg Chappell, Dennis Lillee and Rod Marsh all retired from Australian cricket at the end of the series, and much was expected of Wessels to score consistently in the upcoming series against the West Indies.
1983/84 Australian tour of West Indies
Any hope that Wessels and other new Australian batsmen would cope against the West Indian fast bowling was dashed. Wessels scored 4 and 20 in the first Test and 4 and 4 in the second Test, before injury ruled him out of the rest of the series. He was dismissed by West Indian fast bowler Joel Garner three times, and was nicknamed "Joel's bunny" as a result. For the first time in his Test career, Wessels' form had deserted him and he was not a certainty for selection when the West Indians toured Australia in 1984/85. However he won man of the series during a five-match one day tour of India in September and October 1984.1984/85 West Indian tour of Australia
As a Test player, Wessels' most successful period came during the disastrous West Indian tour of Australia. After scoring only 13 and 0 in the first Test, Wessels was in danger of being dropped from the Australian side. However, due to the poor performance of almost all of Australia's batting in that match, he was retained for the second Test. He responded by going out for 0 after the second ball, and many people thought that his career was over. In the second innings, however, he top scored with 61, giving the selectors no option but to include him for the third Test. Batting up number 3, Wessels top scored again with 98 runs in the first innings and 70 in the second, in a match where the Australian batting was being taken apart by the West Indian bowlers.The fourth Test saw Wessels continue his heavy scoring, with 90 and 0 helping Australia force a draw. It was in the fifth Test, however, which saw him totally dominate the West Indian bowlers with 173. His batting helped Australia to 9 for 471, which was a winning total on a wicket that was taking spin.
Wessels scored 505 runs at an average of 56.11 against the West Indies, which was more than double the number of runs scored by any other Australian batsmen during that series. Given the dominance of West Indian bowling at the time, and the fragility of the Australian batting line-up, Wessels' performance during that series was world class.