CHENNAI SUPERKINGS

Kepler Wessels has transcended boundaries all of his life for the sake of cricket, and his next destination is the city of Chennai, where he has been appointed the coach of the Chennai Super Kings.

Born in South Africa, Wessels grew up in the apartheid era, when the Proteas were banned from international cricket. He moved to Australia and settled there, representing Queensland in the domestic Sheffield Shield competition. He graduated to play for Australia a few years later, and cracked a typically gritty century on his test debut against England. He played an important role in the Australian top order during the early eighties, but after a disappointing series against New Zealand, he quit and moved back to South Africa to play domestic cricket for Orange Free State. He then became the first test captain of South Africa in the post-apartheid era, and led his team diligently and intelligently for a couple of years before finally hanging up his boots from international cricket, once and for all. He also played county cricket for Sussex.

He next took to coaching, and became a hugely successful coach with Eastern Province. He also ran a host of coaching clinics for youngsters all around South Africa. Wessels then went to England and coached Northamptonshire for a couple of seasons, where he again met with resounding success.

“We wanted somebody who would keep the focus on cricket, be a good task master, and help us win the tournament,” said Chennai Super Kings Cricket Manager, V B Chandrasekhar. Wessels is widely acknowledged in the cricketing circles as a man who lives and breathes cricket, who at the same time, enjoys spending time away from it in his various pastimes like martial arts. He is known to be a good man-manager, and he has the experience of playing all around the globe and managing players from different cultures. He is also known to bring his gritty demeanour, which helped him succeed as a cricketer, into his coaching, while being an easily approachable person.

Makhaya Ntini, and Albie Morkel are the two South Africans who will be playing for the Chennai Super Kings, and they will be more than happy to have Wessels as their coach. Ntini who has always spoken highly of Wessels, will have the privilege of teaming up with Wessels and work towards the team’s success.

“This tournament is going to change the face of cricket worldwide,” Wessels said from Chittagong, Bangladesh on hearing about his appointment. “Every team is strong and you have to manage the process quite well because not all the players are available all of the time. And you can only play four overseas players at once,” he added, extremely excited about his new assignment.

Wessels gets the opportunity to coach one of the strongest teams in the IPL line-up with a winning captain in Dhoni and stars like Hayden and Muralitharan in the mix. So Kepler’s cricketing journey continues to cross new barriers, as Chennai prepares to welcome the man they hope will to coach them to glory!

Posted by Kevin Philip at 11:26 AM