South Africa turn to Stuart Broad to help down Australia

Telegraph

2 days ago

Stuart Broad will reopen his long-running, box office battle with Australia when he takes up a coaching consultancy role with South Africa ahead of the World Test Championship final at Lord's this month.
South Africa's first appearance in the World Test Championship final comes at Lord's a week on Wednesday, when they meet the holders Australia.
The Proteas have a potent pace attack featuring Kagiso Rabada, back from a brief drugs ban, and Marco Jansen, and they will have one of England's great quicks in their corner.
Broad retired from playing at the end of the 2023 Ashes with 604 wickets to his name. He has largely pursued a career in the media, and this will be his first coaching gig.
Broad's media commitments mean he will not actually be in the South African dressing room for the match itself. But he will work with the team and coaching staff before the match with his remit being specific plans for the Australian batsmen and how to bowl at Lord's, which can be an awkward venue for the uninitiated because of the slope. Since retiring, Broad has struck up a close relationship with South African cricket when commentating on the SA20 competition, which has led to the short-term tie-up.
Broad took 113 Test wickets at Lord's (at an average of 27.7), second only to his great opening partner Jimmy Anderson. Only Muttiah Muralitharan, who took 116 wickets at SSC in Colombo and 117 wickets in Kandy, has more Test wickets at a single venue.
Broad often saved his best for the Australians, and has more wickets against them than any other bowler, 153. That included eight Ashes five-wicket hauls, one 10-wicket haul, and the scalp of the now-retired David Warner 17 times. But Broad also picked up Australian stalwarts Steve Smith (11 times), Usman Khawaja (eight times), and Travis Head (seven times).
As much as the wickets taken, Broad seemed to understand exactly how to spice up an Ashes contest, a skill the South Africans – who have a spicy history of their own with the Australians after sandpaper-gate – may look to tap in to.
In 2013, he memorably did not walk after edging Ashton Agar to slip – via Brad Haddin's glove – in a tight Ashes encounter at Trent Bridge, drawing the ire of Australia's players, coaches, and fans. In the return Ashes that winter, thousands of Australia fans wore t-shirts reading 'Stuart Broad is a s--- bloke', while the Brisbane tabloid the Courier-Mail refused to print his name.
Even in his last Test, at the Oval in 2023, Broad brought theatre to the Ashes rivalry, changing the bails around in search of luck, which discomforted the jumpy and superstitious Marnus Labuschagne. On the final day, he repeated the trick, and another wicket followed.
Anderson, meanwhile, picked up his first T20 wickets for almost 11 years on Sunday. Playing for Lancashire, he dismissed Durham's openers Graham Clark and Alex Lees in a new-ball burst. His previous T20 appearance was on Blast finals day at Edgbaston in 2014.