Heinrich Klaasen: 'Time to tell the world South Africans are very good under pressure'

South Africa have been in top form in World Cup 2023 and moved another step closer to the semi-finals with a massive win over England on Saturday. England’s 229-run defeat in Mumbai was their biggest defeat in the history of ODI World Cups. Earlier South Africa had defeated Australia by 134 runs and have won three out of four matches so far.

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The star player for South Africa against England was Heinrich Klaasen who smashed a 109 off 67 balls and the centurion declared that the time has come for South Africa to make a “big statement” at the World Cup

“Our World Cup performances, everyone, obviously, has got their tag over us but we have played some good cricket. We’ve been unlucky, and obviously, we did not execute on certain games,” Klaasen said after South Africa’s win.

“But if you look at our games that we have played, we have played some very, very good cricket in the World Cup (history). It is not a surprise that we are playing good cricket.”

“This group has been playing good cricket for the last three years now. We’ve been maturing nicely. It is our time to really try to make a big statement for the world, that South Africans are very good under pressure. We have done it before,” Klaasen said.

Klaasen smashed 12 fours and four sixes during his match-winning innings amid hot and humid conditions which tested him to the extreme. The cricketer said that his knock was one of his “better” hundreds.

“It ranks up to one of my better hundreds purely on the conditions that were out there. I really had to dig deep mentally. Physically, I was not in a good space, but mentally I had to dig very deep there,” Klaasen said.

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“It is like just breathing in hot air and every time you try to run it is just sapping more and more energy and then at the end of the day, your body just does not want to work with you anymore,” he said.

“It is like almost running in a sauna for the whole innings, which is what we obviously prepare for and we are used to these conditions. But it still takes a lot out of the body,” he said.

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