Lions coach Domingo admits to poor performance in T20 Challenge

Lions coach Russell Domingo has acknowledged that they haven’t played good cricket in the ongoing CSA T20 Challenge and highlighted the absence of seven of their regular players to national duty in the subcontinent.

The Lions went into the competition as defending champions and have since returned poor results, as they have failed to win a single game in five fixtures.

Domingo, having been largely successful since taking over as head coach of the Johannesburg-based side, acknowledged that his team simply did not play good cricket in this season’s campaign.

“We haven't played good cricket, that's the bottom line. We made some basic errors, and we haven't done the basics of the game well. The results show that we haven't played good cricket,” Domingo told Independent Media.

“We’ve got to take stock and sort of reflect on where we went wrong and make sure we get better in the next season's T20 campaign.”

While the Lions have been boosted by the availability of Proteas batter Rassie van der Dussen during the T20 Challenge, they also lost seven regular players, including captain Bjorn Fortuin, Nqaba Peter and Delano Potgieter.

Domingo highlighted that having gone through the T20 Challenge without their full strength team has allowed them as the coaching staff to test their depth as a franchise.

Moreover, the Lions were not the only team that lost many players to national duty, be it in the Proteas white ball teams or the SA A teams.

The Titans have also had to release players, a feat that perhaps has also contributed to their woeful campaign thus far. However, the teams that have been successful, including Boland, which have won five out of six games thus far, have barely had to release players for national duty.

“You've got to remember, there's Bjorn Fortuin, there's Cody Yusuf, there's Delano Potgieter, there's Connor Esterhuizen, he's just come back, there's Zubayr Hamza. So there's seven regulars missing, but that's no excuse,” said Domingo.  

“It provides opportunities for some other young players. Some have done well, some haven't done as well. So, it's tested our depth, but it's given us as coaches a good understanding of where we are in terms of our depth at the moment. 

“The teams that have done really well haven't lost a lot of players. You look at Boland, they've got no national players. The Warriors have maybe lost one or two, but haven't lost the nucleus of the team.

“The Dolphins have recruited two players in Leus du Ploy and Anrich Nortje, which has made a big difference because they haven't lost many players. They might have lost Marcus Ackermann and maybe Okuhle Cele. So, those teams haven't lost a lot of players.”

The Lions are out of the tournament but have two more games left. Domingo understands that the two games are critical as they have the ambition of escaping the relegation zone.

Domingo’s men are set to play Western Province at Newlands on Friday at 12 pm SAST.

“There's a lot to play for. Every game, there's the promotion-relegation structure, which is important. We want to try and get off the bottom of the table. That's important for us. We want to try and get back to winning ways,” Domingo said.

“We want to get back into our winning culture and get that habit going again. For two years, we've been fantastic, but we've just had a really bad campaign here. There are still two competitions to play after this that we feel that we can compete for.”

In other fixtures, the Titans will host the Dolphins at SuperSport Park in Centurion on Friday with the fixture set to get underway at 1:30 pm SAST.