When South Africa sent a third-string Test side in February 2024 to New Zealand with their main players involved in SA20, including captain Temba Bavuma, many feared the country’s Test future. But they roared back with successive series victories in the West Indies and at home against Sri Lanka and Pakistan to qualify for the third WTC final of 2023-25.
Temba Bavuma has stepped with the bat and led prospects on many occasions to lock their clash against Australia at Lord’s in June 2025. In nine red-ball games under his leadership, the Proteas are yet to lose an encounter with one drawn result, the only instance for this side in these many fixtures.
In this cycle, the right-handed batter has clubbed 609 runs in 11 innings at an average of over 60 thanks to four fifties and two centuries. In a recent discussion with Hindustan Times, the veteran displayed his delight, with how he had been watching the ball and moving feet well.
“I‘m very happy with where my form is at. Scoring runs is what we want to do as batters and my contribution to the team. I’ve been seeing the ball well. My feet have been moving nicely. And I’m hitting the ball out of the middle more often of late.” Temba Bavuma expressed in the interaction.
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Leading any Test side becomes a tough time as the 34-year-old explained that it was never a dream for him to be in that position, but he always tried to keep a smile on his face under a lot of pressure and so much responsibility.
“Leading the South African team is a lot of responsibility and a lot of pressure. Our fans always expect the best, so you’ve got to make sure that you uphold those expectations. So yeah, a lot of pressure, a lot of responsibility, a lot of satisfaction as well. I’ve never really looked up to anyone from a captaincy point of view. Captaincy was never really a dream of mine.” Temba Bavuma addressed.
Temba Bavuma denies accepting the ‘underdog’ tag against Australia for the WTC 2023-25 final
In the bowling department, Kagiso Rabada and Marco Jansen have handled the expectations on their shoulders. The former is the leading wicket-taker for the Proteas with 47 Test scalps in ten games at an average of under 20, while the southpaw picked up 29 wickets in six Tests at 20.82.
The Cape Town-born shed light on how the Rainbow nation is not a powerhouse but still carries a lot of skill and talent and considers it to be one of the best. The veteran claimed that being on the final is a perfect response to the critics.
The biggest unfair aspect of the World Test Championship is the different number of Tests by various sides. Temba Bavuma has pointed out the importance of a three-match series while he can’t figure out why England gets to play 22 Tests in the cycle, while they take on the field in only 12.
“We’d love to play more in South Africa. We’d love to be able to test our skills a lot more. We’d also like to be able to test our mettle a lot more. I think of the India series we played here at home, which ended 1-1. It was only a two-match series, and I think the end of that series was a bit of an anticlimax.” The middle-order batter of the Proteas elaborated,
“You know, you always play to know who’s the best. And there, you kind of didn’t know who that was or who the best was. So yeah, maybe they can institute that minimum amount of Tests.” Temba Bavuma added.
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He has accepted that the final against Australia would be challenging but isn’t ready to call themselves underdogs like Ab de Villiers, JP Duminy, or Shaun Pollock.
“I guess they have their reasons for seeing us as underdogs. I think many people would have written us off in terms of getting to this point, looking at how our campaign started, our Test Championship started, and look to go and win seven Test matches in a row.” Temba Bavuma explained to Hindustan Times.
Bavuma is excited with the young talent Kwena Maphaka, besides calling the left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj the best spinner that they have produced in South Africa.