Bavuma: 'My focus is on Tests, and I'm going to play the best I can in that format'

After last playing a T20I in September 2023, missing out on the T20 World Cup squad and being released by Sunrisers Eastern Cape in the SA20, Bavuma was asked whether he had made a decision about his T20 future. He did not give a definitive answer but seemed to indicate he understood the ship had sailed.

“It’s not a surprise that I’m not there, but me being in the T20 squad would’ve raised more eyebrows. It’s better that way that I’m not there. My focus now is on Test cricket and I’m going to try to play as best as I can in the format,” Bavuma said from Guyana, where he will lead South Africa in the second Test against West Indies from tomorrow.

“There’s also 50-over cricket that’s coming in the next few months and the one thing that I can trust is that if I get going in Test and 50-over cricket, everything else will follow from there. It’s not a surprise that I’m not in the T20 squad.”

Bavuma’s acceptance of his non-selection for the T20I squad comes after a protracted period of criticism over his strike-rate in the shortest format, particularly at the 2022 T20 World Cup. He captained South Africa at that tournament, where they were eliminated after defeat to Netherlands, and scored 70 runs in five innings at a strike-rate of 17.50.

He was subsequently replaced by Aiden Markram as T20I leader and dropped from the side but took over the Test team. Bavuma made a brief comeback to T20I cricket last year when he played in three matches against Australia and scored 35 runs in three innings, including two ducks. He played one match for SEC at the SA20 earlier this year and made 33 not out and also played for the Lions in the CSA domestic T20 Challenge, where he scored 171 runs in 15 matches at a strike-rate of 117.93, considered too low for a frontline T20 batter. That may have been what he was referring to when he said that if he was picked it would “raise more eyebrows.”

White-ball coach Rob Walter has opted for Reeza Hendricks – who did not play a game at the 2022 T20 World Cup despite scoring four successive fifties in the lead-up – as a regular opener and will pair him with Rassie van der Dussen or Ryan Rickelton at the top of the order against West Indies.

In the long-term, if Quinton de Kock does not continue to play T20Is, South Africa could also look at Matthew Breetzke, who is not in the squad for West Indies, as an opening option. All that doesn’t mean Bavuma is not a white-ball player at all. He remains South Africa’s ODI captain, led them to the semi-finals of the last World Cup and is expected to captain them at the upcoming Champions Trophy.

Firdose Moonda is ESPNcricinfo’s correspondent for South Africa and women’s cricket