Saints retain their T20 National Champions title

April 04, 2017 | Boys’ College

The 2017 Coca-Cola Schools T20 Challenge National Finals will took place at the University of Stellenbosch Cricket Oval from 24-26 March. This challenge sees South Africa’s top 8 school T20 teams battling it out to be named national champions, offering school sides the chance of representing, and donning the colours of their local franchise teams.

Mr Wim Jansen, Director of Cricket at the Boys’ College:

St Stithians have now become the first school to win the Coca-Cola T20 three times. We are also the first school to win it back to back, a great achievement! We have managed to win the Johnny Waite and the Franchise final four out of the last five years. Great credit to our players and coaching staff who have sacrificed many hours to achieve this.

The reason for our success on the cricket field.....

There are no short cuts, only hard work and practice! Secondly, to become better at this game on has to play more. That is exactly what we have done, play-play-play! We have played 23 games since we started in January this year, a key aspect to our success. We also have a great combination of coaches working with our 1st X1. Bongani Ndaba has a great way with the boys and reads the game well. Fergus Gray is a fantastic disciplinarian and keeps the game ultra-simple. Philip Koen is keen to learn and very enthusiastic. Our 1st X1 cricketers this year are a special bunch, with fantastic skill sets. The opening left and right hand combination pair of Matt Erasmus and Josh Richards compliment each other beautifully. Our other special combination is our spin twins! Jason Knibbs our right hand off spinner has the ability to dry up the runs and put our opponents under pressure and Craig Meier is a prodigious spinner of a cricket ball and is our leading strike bowler. His left arm wrist spinners come with a lethal googly, this delivery has sent many a batsmen to the pavilion. Curtis Campher our captain has lead the team with passion and pride fighting for every single run for us.

We played our best cricket of the tournament on the final day during the semi-final and final. In the semi-final we beat St Andrew's by 49 runs and in the final we bowled out Hudson Park for just 66. Our two spinners picked up 7 wickets and we chased the runs down in just six overs.

We are extremely proud of this magnificent achievement the by our cricketers! They have set the bar very high for the teams that will follow. Credit to our coaching staff for the skills transfer and enormous time sacrifice.

Match 1: Fri 24 March

St Stithians vs Wynberg

St Stithians 161/0

Matthew Erasmus 77*

Joshua Richards 68*

Wynberg 155 all out

Craig Meier 3/19

Player of the match: Matthew Erasmus

Match 2: Fri 24 March

St Stithians vs Prestige College

St Stithians 144/6

JP Bloem 29*