‘Why are you complaining? … You can’t walk off until you score your hundred’: Marco Jansen reveals chat with Heinrich Klassen | Cricket-world-cup News
It was almost a throwback to the famous Chennai Test of 1987 when Dean Jones threw up repeatedly on a humid day and thought about walking off the field. It was then his captain Allan Border snapped at him, “Yes, go, we will get a tough Queenslander in!” That barb and the reference to the next man in Greg Ritchie, from Queensland, stirred the Victorian Jones to his greatest Test knock, a double ton that’s part of the cricket lore.
Similar scenes almost played out at the Wankhede stadium in the South Africa vs England game. When Marco Jansen walked out to join a physically struggling Heinrich Klassen, this is what he said: “Why you complaining?!”
“He was 81 or something and I knew the hard work he did to get there. I told him, you are not going to walk off this ground until you get your hundred. You can do whatever you want after getting there,” Jansen told reporters after South Africa gave a shellacking to England. “ the end of the innings, I knew what he was talking about; it was tough out there. But I am not going to allow him to work that hard and not get to the century. It was just a matter of 2-3 shots! Luckily he lened to me. I didn’t think he was going to but he did. I knew how physically tough it was; I am very happy that he got his hundred.”
Klassen also spoke about how hard it got for him physically. “It was like being in a Sauna. It was very draining. I couldn’t breathe. It’s like the body has given up and I had to dig really really deep to carry on. Jansen helped me through that phase,” he told reporters.Most Read
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Jansen put the conditions in perspective. “Tonight was very tough; I have to take a lot of ice baths to recover. It was very taxing. You have to drink lots of fluids else you might get a blurry vision. I think there is one place in South Africa that may be similar to this is Paarl; it’s not this humid but very hot,” Jansen said.
Jansen himself indulged himself smashing around the bowlers and described the joy it gave to him.
“I am very very happy. When I grew up, I opened the batting. Personally, I enjoy my batting a lot. I might not be technically as pleasing on the eye as other guys but I love batting. And I have worked hard on it. I know my main job is to perform with the ball.”
