As cricket eases closer to the start of the domestic season with the CSA 4-Day Domestic Series, the Dolphins have spent the uncertain lockdown period honing their red-ball skills, and coach Imraan Khan believes his staff and players found a good way to approach their preparation.

‘The attitudes of the guys have been fantastic, they have been working extremely hard,’ Khan said.

‘The lockdown presented us with a nice opportunity to train in a different way with the smaller groups and upskill the players as well through this long pre-season.

‘We’ve had an opportunity to work on specific skills that we feel we can improve on as a team, so it’s been a good period for us and now we can go into specific four-day cricket skills and training.’

The CSA 4-Day Domestic Series has traditionally always been the competition that opens the new season and it appears that the players are preparing to start with the red-ball campaign. Having that to work towards now gives the players and coaches more of a streamlined focus.

‘It’s always better when you know what you are working towards,’ Khan commented. ‘Knowing that we have a new season on the horizon has given us good clarity in terms of how we want to prepare and lead up into the first game of the campaign.’

The Dolphins have recruited the likes of Ruan de Swart for the upcoming season and will have Eathan Bosch back along with Rob Frylinck, Keshav Maharaj, Prenelan Subrayen and Senuran Muthusamy to give the side a number of all-rounder options.

‘The one thing this union has been blessed with over the last few years is a number of quality all-rounders to pick from.

‘If you look back over the seasons we’ve had good seam-bowling all-rounders and now with our spin-bowling all-rounders we have many options. Long may that continue!

‘It’s great to have Eathan [Bosch] back in the mix, he was missed last season in four-day cricket and we are looking forward to having a full squad available for that first game,’ Khan added.

After finishing last season with the One-Day Cup trophy, Khan is hoping that the side can carry that belief and confidence into the new season.

‘We always knew that we had the ability but the mental switch from the guys last season was fantastic.

‘The guys have built on that through the winter and the culture and environment are strong at the moment and that always bodes well going into a new season,’ the coach concluded.