South Africa's Dewald Brevis, on ODI debut, smashed a six off his first ball but didn't last too long during the first Australia-South Africa one-dayer.
Brevis had a bumper T20I series that preceded the ODIs, smashing 180 runs from three innings, including a 41-ball hundred. The 22-year-old walked in at the fall of Tristan Stubbs' wicket in the 41st over: clearly, he didn't need any warming up.
Brevis kicks off ODI career with a six
Facing Travis Head, he crunched his first ball – a short one – over the long-on fence. Some way to start his ODI career.
The next one, Head floated it up a a bit: Brevis went down one knee, and attempted to access the same area, but ended up not getting enough elevation. Alex Carey took the catch, bringing an end to the briefest of debut cameos.
Head ended up taking four wickets – for the second time in ODIs – but South Africa still put up a solid 296 on the board.
1st ODI, Australia vs South Africa
vs
- Ball by ball Over
Interestingly, Brevis became the first ODI cricketer ever to start his career with a six, and get dismissed the next ball. In T20Is, Greece's Samader Shadab did the same while Aman Desai (Singapore) and Mangaliso Mosehle (South Africa) both hit their first ball for six and were run out before facing another one.
Powered by Aiden Markram's 82, and fifties for Matthew Breetzke (he now has 290 runs from his first three ODI innings) and Temba Bavuma, South Africa posted a total that Australia eventually fell short of by 98 runs. Prenelan Subrayen, the other ODI debutant alongside Brevis, supported Maharaj well with figures of 1-46 in ten overs.
Keshav Maharaj took his maiden ODI five-wicket haul, with only Mitchell Marsh (88) managing to cross fifty.
Brevis, referred to widely as 'Baby AB' for his AB de Villiers-like hitting style, also made his Test debut earlier this year. Facing Zimbabwe in the two-Test series, he managed 51 & 3 on Test debut, and hit 30 (35) in the game Wiaan Mulder hit his record-breaking 367*.
Follow Wisden for all cricket updates, including live scores, match stats, quizzes and more. Stay up to date with the latest cricket news, player updates, team standings, match highlights, video analysis and live match odds.
