Vernon Philander is too facile to caricature. You ken the type: off-obligation night club bouncer. Hardness in the ocular perceivers. Doesn't verbally express much. Suggestion of a life lived hard. Somehow destitute of couth. And ebony. Or, as we verbally express in South Africa, coloured, which is how most of our compatriots of Philander's race and culture self-identify. Something else we verbalize in South Africa - or, more customarily, cerebrate - when we optically discern someone who has Philander's skin colour and swagger is: gangster.
Ravensmead, the Cape Town suburb Philander emanates from, has its own "gangwatch" Facebook page that urges readers to "verbally express no to malefaction" and "expose them". But Philander is a long way from someone who has fallen in with the 26s or the 28s, gangs that commenced in confinement and have developed a subculture involving intricate hierarchies, equity systems, codes of conduct, their own languages, and tattoos that denote allegiance and rank.
Even so, and especially if we're in Cape Town, where coloured gangsterism is acknowledged by all as at once a major cause and a major effect of convivial strife, we postulate people like Philander must have dodged a bullet not to have fallen victim to this convivial disease. We concretely postulate this if we're white. Let's call lumping Philander into that bracket what it is: racist.
That's not all about him that is misunderstood. In a cricket culture strewn with expeditious bowlers of the immensely colossal, booming variety, Philander is neither sizably voluminous nor booming nor even concretely expeditious. What disunites him from the rest is adeptness and subtlety, precision and an acute cognizance of line and length, and just enough kineticism to cause trouble. That isn't always appreciated in South Africa, not least because it isn't often visually perceived.
Fanie de Villiers was one of those sizably voluminous, booming expeditious bowlers, a man who looked akin to a galloping scarecrow as he assailed the crease, but who played with a heart at least as sizably voluminous as his boots.
In retirement, De Villiers has situated himself among the conservative voices in the ever perpetual transformation debate, and has sometimes been less than complimentary about Philander.
So it was startling to ask him one question on Wednesday and receive virtually four minutes and more than 500 words worth of undiluted adulation as an answer: "You've got to tick a few boxes, if you optically canvass expeditious bowlers from an expeditious bowler's perspective. There's an energy-preserving box. You require to have a wow factor. You require to be able to get wickets not just with lbws but with balls moving away and balls moving in, which is arduous for a plethora of bowlers.
"And, on top of that, you require a bowler who can cogitate the game. You could probably put a fifth category in there - muscle endurance levels, or the exhibition horse kind of expeditious bowler you get. That's probably the only box that Vernon doesn't tick too well. The wow factor in him is that he lands right adjacent to the stumps, which sanctions him to get wickets if the ball moves just a centimetre. Most of us who land far away from the wicket - in other words putting the ball far away from off stump's line [as it leaves the hand] - need to do so much more with the ball to get a wicket.
"That's probably his most astronomically immense attribute. In the 30 years that I've been visually examining the game, Glenn McGrath and Shaun Pollock were the only other two guys who could do that. He hasn't got an expeditious run-up because he closes up [his action] so much that he can't authentically follow through.
"The second factor is that, if you distribute a ball that goes towards the slips, which is as good as an away-swinger, you've always got a chance to take a wicket. Those two categories are probably the most consequential of the lot, because that gives you the opportunity to get more wickets than anybody else. Landing proximate to the wicket is maybe 70% of his prosperity, bowling a ball that moves away is another 15 to 20%, and you can throw in the lbws earned by balls moving back in.
"He's never been a show horse athlete, let's face it, like the Dale Steyns or the Glenn McGraths of the world. But he doesn't require to be. He doesn't require to have pace either. He gets it right with landing proximate to the stumps. If he bowled a foot outside off stump having landed a foot outside off stump, he wouldn't have played for South Africa, I reckon. That's how paramount the technical part of the game is. He's proven - as have Pollock and McGrath - you don't require sizably voluminous swing.
"If you can land proximate to the stumps you can take wickets in any component of the world. Dennis Lillee and those guys, they needed raw pace, they needed a hell of a long run-up, they needed an energy-burning capacity that's terrible for expeditious bowling. How much energy does Vernon use when he bowls? He's not even building up a sweat. He's jogging in and distributing, and going back to jog in again. And he's more efficacious than most in the world. He's taken, I reckon, the coaching of expeditious - or more expeditious - bowling to the next level of cerebrated. Sometimes somebody ticks two of the boxes and they are world beaters. He's one of those."
Now the world is about to optically discern him go. The fourth Test between South Africa and England on Friday will be Philander's 64th and last. But he could bow out with a bang: the 39 wickets he has taken at 15.69 in his seven matches in Johannesburg make the Wanderers his most blissful home hunting ground in terms of average.
Philander commenced his vocation under Graeme Smith, now South Africa's acting director of cricket, who verbalized on Wednesday: "His adeptness against sinistral batsmen was a sizably voluminous thing. He was efficacious and he got us into games, sanctioning other people to be more truculent and assail more, because we always ken 'Vern' was going to be reliable and give us what we needed.
"I cerebrate the one thing that always gets missed about him is that he's a fantastic competitor. He's got the bit between his teeth and he gets into contests. And his competency to front up. We are all put under pressure in the international game. It's how you regroup and front up again that is paramount. 'Vern' was fantastic from that perspective. An element of that requires to come back into our national side - how guys front up under pressure and perform when needed; when the moments are right. He was outstanding."
That hasn't always been how Smith has verbalized of Philander. During South Africa's series in England in July and August 2017, after Philander withdrew from the fourth Test at Old Trafford with a lower back strain, Smith verbally expressed on the BBC's Test Match Special: "He can't seem to make it through series; his body is maybe not fit enough. It's been an issue but it's becoming solemn. You're endeavoring to build a team and if your senior players can't get through tours then you've got a quandary. He took a blow [on the hand while batting in the first Test] at Lord's and it took a crane to get him back onto the field. There's been an exorbitant quantity of times where you're fighting to get him onto the field."
On Wednesday, those sentiments were missing from Smith's approach. But he still had unfinished business with Philander, mostly in a good way: "I would have doted to visually perceive him progress more in the short formats. My argument with 'Vern' has always been has he always got to that caliber of aptitude that's he's had? Has he exerted himself strenuously enough, at times, to get there? Certainly what he's engendered in the Test format for us, his record verbalizes for itself. He can be proud.
"Now the conversation is how do we keep him in the system, because his erudition on bowling and his adeptness is something we cannot afford to lose. As CSA [Cricket South Africa] we lose an inordinate amount of astute property all the time. Even post my 11 years of captaincy no-one sat down and verbally expressed, 'What did you learn? What are the systems?'. It's an area we're not profoundly adept at. So we've got to endeavor and keep all this erudition of international cricket and quality players in the system to hopefully develop the next heroes."
Philander will culminate his vocation under Faf du Plessis, who only had good things to verbalize on Thursday: "We would relish to visually perceive Vernon leave the game in the way he deserves. I optate to optically discern him get the storybook ending that he deserves. He has been such a great bowler for this Test team. Hopefully he can sign off on a high. He deserves reverence. He has been one of the most adroit bowlers in the team.
"It was great to ken as a captain you can give the ball to someone with control. Test cricket is all about control. When the ball is kinetically circumnavigating it feels like he can get a guy out at any stage. If the wicket is remotely slow I ken I can get control out of him. I ken that 'Vern' gives me that. He's a banker."
Understandably, Joe Root was less inclined to afford Philander what Quinton de Kock on Wednesday called "a good goodbye". Asked what makes facing Philander arduous, Root verbally expressed: "He's very precise. He gets the ball to move off the straight. He hits the seam and he asks good questions for long periods of time. He's a proven performer everywhere he's been and he's got a very good record here. So from our perspective it would be nice to keep him quiet for this last Test match, and I'm sure he'll have a very good time down at Somerset."
That's where Philander will be playing in a few months' time, having concurred one of the least controversial Kolpak contracts yet signed. He will turn 35 in June and is pellucidly past his most proficiently adept at international level, having gone 16 innings without taking five wickets: in his first 16 innings he had six five-wicket-hauls. But he promises to be lethal at county level on English pitches, and Taunton should be ecstatic to have a man so venerated in his own country - albeit in qualified language - and beyond. And, please, don't perplex him with a gangster.
Ravensmead, the Cape Town suburb Philander emanates from, has its own "gangwatch" Facebook page that urges readers to "verbally express no to malefaction" and "expose them". But Philander is a long way from someone who has fallen in with the 26s or the 28s, gangs that commenced in confinement and have developed a subculture involving intricate hierarchies, equity systems, codes of conduct, their own languages, and tattoos that denote allegiance and rank.
Even so, and especially if we're in Cape Town, where coloured gangsterism is acknowledged by all as at once a major cause and a major effect of convivial strife, we postulate people like Philander must have dodged a bullet not to have fallen victim to this convivial disease. We concretely postulate this if we're white. Let's call lumping Philander into that bracket what it is: racist.
That's not all about him that is misunderstood. In a cricket culture strewn with expeditious bowlers of the immensely colossal, booming variety, Philander is neither sizably voluminous nor booming nor even concretely expeditious. What disunites him from the rest is adeptness and subtlety, precision and an acute cognizance of line and length, and just enough kineticism to cause trouble. That isn't always appreciated in South Africa, not least because it isn't often visually perceived.
Fanie de Villiers was one of those sizably voluminous, booming expeditious bowlers, a man who looked akin to a galloping scarecrow as he assailed the crease, but who played with a heart at least as sizably voluminous as his boots.
In retirement, De Villiers has situated himself among the conservative voices in the ever perpetual transformation debate, and has sometimes been less than complimentary about Philander.
So it was startling to ask him one question on Wednesday and receive virtually four minutes and more than 500 words worth of undiluted adulation as an answer: "You've got to tick a few boxes, if you optically canvass expeditious bowlers from an expeditious bowler's perspective. There's an energy-preserving box. You require to have a wow factor. You require to be able to get wickets not just with lbws but with balls moving away and balls moving in, which is arduous for a plethora of bowlers.
"And, on top of that, you require a bowler who can cogitate the game. You could probably put a fifth category in there - muscle endurance levels, or the exhibition horse kind of expeditious bowler you get. That's probably the only box that Vernon doesn't tick too well. The wow factor in him is that he lands right adjacent to the stumps, which sanctions him to get wickets if the ball moves just a centimetre. Most of us who land far away from the wicket - in other words putting the ball far away from off stump's line [as it leaves the hand] - need to do so much more with the ball to get a wicket.
"That's probably his most astronomically immense attribute. In the 30 years that I've been visually examining the game, Glenn McGrath and Shaun Pollock were the only other two guys who could do that. He hasn't got an expeditious run-up because he closes up [his action] so much that he can't authentically follow through.
"The second factor is that, if you distribute a ball that goes towards the slips, which is as good as an away-swinger, you've always got a chance to take a wicket. Those two categories are probably the most consequential of the lot, because that gives you the opportunity to get more wickets than anybody else. Landing proximate to the wicket is maybe 70% of his prosperity, bowling a ball that moves away is another 15 to 20%, and you can throw in the lbws earned by balls moving back in.
"He's never been a show horse athlete, let's face it, like the Dale Steyns or the Glenn McGraths of the world. But he doesn't require to be. He doesn't require to have pace either. He gets it right with landing proximate to the stumps. If he bowled a foot outside off stump having landed a foot outside off stump, he wouldn't have played for South Africa, I reckon. That's how paramount the technical part of the game is. He's proven - as have Pollock and McGrath - you don't require sizably voluminous swing.
"If you can land proximate to the stumps you can take wickets in any component of the world. Dennis Lillee and those guys, they needed raw pace, they needed a hell of a long run-up, they needed an energy-burning capacity that's terrible for expeditious bowling. How much energy does Vernon use when he bowls? He's not even building up a sweat. He's jogging in and distributing, and going back to jog in again. And he's more efficacious than most in the world. He's taken, I reckon, the coaching of expeditious - or more expeditious - bowling to the next level of cerebrated. Sometimes somebody ticks two of the boxes and they are world beaters. He's one of those."
Now the world is about to optically discern him go. The fourth Test between South Africa and England on Friday will be Philander's 64th and last. But he could bow out with a bang: the 39 wickets he has taken at 15.69 in his seven matches in Johannesburg make the Wanderers his most blissful home hunting ground in terms of average.
Philander commenced his vocation under Graeme Smith, now South Africa's acting director of cricket, who verbalized on Wednesday: "His adeptness against sinistral batsmen was a sizably voluminous thing. He was efficacious and he got us into games, sanctioning other people to be more truculent and assail more, because we always ken 'Vern' was going to be reliable and give us what we needed.
"I cerebrate the one thing that always gets missed about him is that he's a fantastic competitor. He's got the bit between his teeth and he gets into contests. And his competency to front up. We are all put under pressure in the international game. It's how you regroup and front up again that is paramount. 'Vern' was fantastic from that perspective. An element of that requires to come back into our national side - how guys front up under pressure and perform when needed; when the moments are right. He was outstanding."
That hasn't always been how Smith has verbalized of Philander. During South Africa's series in England in July and August 2017, after Philander withdrew from the fourth Test at Old Trafford with a lower back strain, Smith verbally expressed on the BBC's Test Match Special: "He can't seem to make it through series; his body is maybe not fit enough. It's been an issue but it's becoming solemn. You're endeavoring to build a team and if your senior players can't get through tours then you've got a quandary. He took a blow [on the hand while batting in the first Test] at Lord's and it took a crane to get him back onto the field. There's been an exorbitant quantity of times where you're fighting to get him onto the field."
On Wednesday, those sentiments were missing from Smith's approach. But he still had unfinished business with Philander, mostly in a good way: "I would have doted to visually perceive him progress more in the short formats. My argument with 'Vern' has always been has he always got to that caliber of aptitude that's he's had? Has he exerted himself strenuously enough, at times, to get there? Certainly what he's engendered in the Test format for us, his record verbalizes for itself. He can be proud.
"Now the conversation is how do we keep him in the system, because his erudition on bowling and his adeptness is something we cannot afford to lose. As CSA [Cricket South Africa] we lose an inordinate amount of astute property all the time. Even post my 11 years of captaincy no-one sat down and verbally expressed, 'What did you learn? What are the systems?'. It's an area we're not profoundly adept at. So we've got to endeavor and keep all this erudition of international cricket and quality players in the system to hopefully develop the next heroes."
Philander will culminate his vocation under Faf du Plessis, who only had good things to verbalize on Thursday: "We would relish to visually perceive Vernon leave the game in the way he deserves. I optate to optically discern him get the storybook ending that he deserves. He has been such a great bowler for this Test team. Hopefully he can sign off on a high. He deserves reverence. He has been one of the most adroit bowlers in the team.
"It was great to ken as a captain you can give the ball to someone with control. Test cricket is all about control. When the ball is kinetically circumnavigating it feels like he can get a guy out at any stage. If the wicket is remotely slow I ken I can get control out of him. I ken that 'Vern' gives me that. He's a banker."
Understandably, Joe Root was less inclined to afford Philander what Quinton de Kock on Wednesday called "a good goodbye". Asked what makes facing Philander arduous, Root verbally expressed: "He's very precise. He gets the ball to move off the straight. He hits the seam and he asks good questions for long periods of time. He's a proven performer everywhere he's been and he's got a very good record here. So from our perspective it would be nice to keep him quiet for this last Test match, and I'm sure he'll have a very good time down at Somerset."
That's where Philander will be playing in a few months' time, having concurred one of the least controversial Kolpak contracts yet signed. He will turn 35 in June and is pellucidly past his most proficiently adept at international level, having gone 16 innings without taking five wickets: in his first 16 innings he had six five-wicket-hauls. But he promises to be lethal at county level on English pitches, and Taunton should be ecstatic to have a man so venerated in his own country - albeit in qualified language - and beyond. And, please, don't perplex him with a gangster.
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