Marizanne Kapp and Dane Van Niekerk keep work and home separate
Sydney Sixers’ couple Marizanne Kapp and Dane Van Niekerk together are spearheading the side’s bowling attack, but you’d be surprised by the one topic that will often spark an argument between them.
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MARIZANNE Kapp and Dane Van Niekerk know better than to offer each other friendly advice or pointers on their game.
The Sydney Sixers’ South African pair, who were married July last year, spend nearly all their time together and that means work — cricket — is almost a taboo subject in their household.
“I think most of our fights are probably about cricket,” Kapp said.
“So we try to minimise the chat about cricket at home. But if I recognise something that might help Dane or I have a few ideas, I’ll mention it, but, I mean, we know each other’s games quite well and we know we are at our best and we do what we do well.”
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Even on-field, they tend to keep their distance — it’s even tough to find a picture of them together during a WBBL match.
“I think again, that’s more when most of our fights start because a misfield or something (a dropped catch, offers Van Niekerk) you’re always a bit harder on that person,” Kapp continued.
“If it’s not going too well, you know the person very well so you try to help where you can but I think we’re quite hard on each other.”
Luckily the two haven’t needed to dissect each other’s games too much this season.
Kapp and Van Niekerk have spearheaded the Sydney Sixers bowling attack, helping the club that has one the past two titles to a top of the table finish that was sealed even before their final match on Monday, which they lost to Melbourne Stars by five wickets.
Legspinner Van Niekerk and right arm medium Kapp finished as seventh and fifth top wicket-takers in the league respectively with 17 and 18 wickets each.
They’re happy to they have delivered for the Sixers and are confident they can continue to do so when they take on Melbourne Renegades in Saturday’s semi-final at Drummoyne Oval.
“I’m just happy I’m taking wickets, I was going through a very dry patch,” Van Niekerk said.
“It’s always nice. You come into a club and sign for a club and want to well for the club. I guess we are doing really well at the moment, so I’ll take that.”
“It’s not always about the wickets,” Kapp added. “I just try to be as economical as I can because I usually take three overs in the power play.
“I’m confident for this weekend after (Monday’s) game (against Stars) because I thought it was a fairly flat wicket and I got the ball to move a bit. I’ll go into this game being a lot more positive than I was this season.”
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The Sixers have a good record against Renegades having beaten them twice already, which included souring the Melbourne side’s end to the regular season as they turned a 2-4 record around to be 5-2 for the back end.
That won’t lead to any false confidence for Sydney though.
“We know they’re a really good side,” Van Niekerk said.
“They’ve got some really great players and some match winners and Sophie Molineux is in pretty good form … We know they’re going to bring it and we’re definitely not going to look at previous results.
“It’s going to be a different pitch, so we’re definitely going to go out there with the mindset of they can beat any team and we can’t be too relaxed going against them. We know they can come really hard at us.”
WBBL SEMI-FINALS
Saturday, January 19 — Drummoyne Oval
10.40am Sydney Thunder v Brisbane Heat
1.50pm Sydney Sixers v Melbourne Renegades
Originally published as Marizanne Kapp and Dane Van Niekerk keep work and home separate
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