{"id":960,"date":"2026-01-03T18:46:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T18:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/960\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T18:46:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T18:46:09","slug":"erasmus-to-lead-young-looking-namibia-at-t20-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/960\/","title":{"rendered":"Erasmus to lead young-looking Namibia at T20 World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/team\/namibia-28\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Namibia<\/a> have named a host of young and inexperienced players in their squad of 15 for the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/series\/icc-men-s-t20-world-cup-2025-26-1502138\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">men&#8217;s T20 World Cup<\/a> in February and March next year in India and Sri Lanka, with as many as five players with fewer than ten international games under their belts. Giving them company are familiar names like captain <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/gerhard-erasmus-519070\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Gerhard Erasmus<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/jan-nicol-loftie-eaton-1071473\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jan Nicol Loftie-Eaton<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/zane-green-596664\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Zane Green<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/bernard-scholtz-330223\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Bernard Scholtz<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/jan-frylinck-482478\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jan Frylinck<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/jj-smit-553821\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">JJ Smit<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/malan-kruger-574638\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Malan Kruger<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/ruben-trumpelmann-698317\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ruben Trumpelmann<\/a> and shepherding them will be a back room that&#8217;s led by Craig Williams, and recently bolstered by the inclusion of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/gary-kirsten-45813\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Gary Kirsten<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/jack-brassell-1310415\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jack Brassell<\/a> is just 20, has played nine ODIs and 18 T20Is, and will be leading the fast-bowling attack with the relatively more experienced 25-year-old <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/ben-shikongo-1069820\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ben Shikongo<\/a>, who has played 23 ODIs and 40 T20Is and was one of the stars of Namibia&#8217;s win over Tanzania in the qualifying match that put them in the T20 World Cup.<\/p>\n<p>Bowling alongside them could be <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/max-heingo-1495161\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Max Heingo<\/a>, who made his international debut in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/series\/south-africa-in-namibia-2025-26-1487816\/namibia-vs-south-africa-only-t20i-1487824\/full-scorecard\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Namibia&#8217;s historic T20I win<\/a> over South Africa in October, where he picked up 2 for 32, sending back Lhuan-dre Pretorius and Donovan Ferreira.<\/p>\n<p><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"712\" width=\"570\"\/>Namibia squad\u00a0ESPNcricinfo Ltd<\/p>\n<p>The squad also has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/louren-steenkamp-596087\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Louren Steenkamp<\/a>, the 28-year-old top-order batter who has turned out in seven T20Is and has a strike rate of 126.85; 22-year-old middle-order batter <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/jan-balt-1178066\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jan Balt<\/a>, just three ODIs and six T20Is old; 21-year-old <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/dylan-leicher-1256933\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Dylan Leicher<\/a>, another middle-order batter with five ODIs and 14 T20Is behind him; and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/willem-myburgh-695271\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Willem Myburgh<\/a>, the 25-year-old allrounder who has played just the solitary ODI so far. The lone travelling reserve is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/cricketers\/alexander-busing-volschenk-1234278\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Alexander Busing-Volschenk<\/a>, the 20-year-old allrounder who has played five T20Is.<\/p>\n<p>The big news for Namibia in the lead-up to the World Cup was the appointment of Kirsten. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espncricinfo.com\/story\/t20-world-cup-2026-namibia-unveil-gary-kirsten-as-national-mens-team-consultant-1514750\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kirsten was unveiled<\/a> as a consultant with the men&#8217;s national teams on December 7 last year, and said at the time that he hoped to &#8220;add value to their preparation for the T20 World Cup in February next year&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Namibia are grouped with hosts India, Netherlands, Pakistan and USA at the T20 World Cup.<\/p>\n<p>Namibia squad for the men&#8217;s T20 World Cup<\/p>\n<p>Gerhard Erasmus (capt), Zane Green (wk), Bernard Scholtz, Ruben Trumpelmann, JJ Smit, Jan Frylinck, Louren Steenkamp, Malan Kruger, Jan Nicol Loftie-Eaton, Jack Brassell, Ben Shikongo, Jan Balt, Dylan Leicher, Willem Myburgh, Max Heingo, Alexander Busing-Volschenk (travelling reserve)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Namibia have named a host of young and inexperienced players in their squad of 15 for the men&#8217;s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":961,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[102],"class_list":{"0":"post-960","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-namibia","8":"tag-namibia"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}