Ex-Proteas Skipper Johan Botha Earns Australian Citizenship
Nov 24, 2016 at 12:49 PM
Former South African captain and all-rounder Johan Botha has earned an Australian citizenship now, his Big Bash League (BBL) side Sydney Sixers confirmed through social media on Thursday.
Off-spinner and allrounder @johan_botha has become an Aussie citizen. Congrats mate! Read more > https://t.co/r0LIKTV1IC pic.twitter.com/ydSt0qO3jh
— Sydney Sixers (@SixersBBL) November 23, 2016
Botha has represented Proteas in 5 Tests, 78 One Day Internationals and 40 T20Is after making his debut against India in 2005 in Hyderabad.
The off-spinner who moved to Australia in 2012 has now registered with the Sydney Sixers as a local player on their roster. After speaking to side’s website recently, Botha said he is happy to own the citizenship of Australia.
“It’s been a bit of a process but very happy to finally get it over the line. I think when we came over four years ago this wasn’t our main intention or main plan, but as time has gone on everyone has just settled really well and I suppose this was just the next step for us as a family and for our future”
The 34-year-old started off playing in Australia with the South Australian Redbacks in 2012 season of BBL and later settled down with his family in Adelaide itself. The ex T20 skipper of South Africa says he loves his current city (Sydney) and looks forward to spending more time here.
“The six weeks in Sydney fits really well, it’s obviously the long school holidays so all four of us can come up to Sydney. It’s a great time of the year to be in Sydney and we really enjoyed it last year and all four of us are really looking forward to it again.”
Having played around 224 T20 games across the globe so far, Botha now gears up for the 2016-17 BBL season which starts from 20th December. His team Sydney Sixers will aim to repeat the heroics they produced in 2011, the year when they won the title for the first time.
“As a team, we’d definitely like to bounce back and show why the Sixers are one of the better teams in the competition,” Botha said. “We have some work to do from last season, obviously we didn’t play at our best and we had some injuries, but that’s no excuse.”