Johannesburg, Jan. 29: An interim appointment he might be but South Africa’s new cricket coach Corrie van Zyl is all excited about his job and wants to instill discipline in the side, who head to India on Saturday for a Test and ODI series.
“I believe in team culture. The team must look after discipline and if they can’t then it becomes my responsibility. I will not pass the buck on that,” van Zyl said.
“I’m not sure if it’s going to be stranger for the players who knew me as an assistant or for me, because they are really going to see a different side of me. As the assistant, you do what the head coach wants, you follow orders. As the coach, you make the rules,” he added.
Van Zyl was appointed coach after Mickey Arthur stepped down from the post due to differences with captain Graeme Smith.
Van Zyl, who had assisted Arthur in the past, singled out Ashwell Price as one of his immediate concerns and said he would like to talk to the opener about his role in the team.
“I really want to chat to him (Prince) and find out what he wants to do. They must be certain things we can juggle around but ideally I think he should bat where he would like to be,” van Zyl told a cricket website.
Van Zyl said he always wanted to coach the national team but never imagined that the job would be his in such circumstances.
“After my stint as the assistant coach, I felt that I needed to look after my own team, so I went back to the Free State and coached the Eagles from the beginning of the franchise system (2004-05) until last season,” said van Zyl, who assisted three national coaches and also won six titles while in charge of the Eagles.
“I was hoping to take over from Mickey at some stage. I would have wanted it to do it under different circumstances and would have preferred it if it was on Mickey’s own terms,” he added.
A former pacer, van Zyl had played for Free State along with Arthur during the early 1990s.
Asked if he would accept the coaching job if permanently given a chance, van Zyl said, “Any coach that is worth his salt would want to coach at national level. I would be foolish to turn it down.”
South Africa will start their tour of India with a Test series beginning February 6 in Nagpur.
— PTI
