It’s been quite a journey both on and off the cricket field for Cornelius Johannes van der Walt, but it reaches the finishing line this year after being appointed captain of Carrickfergus — and getting a UK passport.
Middle Road was always his likely destination but it was only because of CJ’s — it’s always CJ — future father-in-law that he found the club.
Having met Shona Lee, whom he married last year, in school in Johannesburg, CJ’s decision to ‘make a go’ of cricket led him to the overseas professional job in Glasgow as a 19-year-old in 2016 and, to stay close to him, Shona Lee took a gap year and visited her father who was then living in Northern Ireland.
At every opportunity, CJ would nip across the Irish Sea to be with Shona Lee and it was the same the following year when he was a pro in the Cheshire Cricket League.
In 2018, Shona Lee’s father was living in an apartment on the hill above Carrickfergus Cricket Club and, as CJ puts i t: “It would be handy if I played here”.
The wheels were put in motion and, although he couldn’t play the first year because he hadn’t the right visa, he got past the red tape and made his Carrick debut in 2019.
He made such an impression in his first two seasons that he was called up to the Northern Knights squad for the final three T20 games of the Covid-hit season of 2020 but is still waiting for the call since.
“I’m disappointed not to go further but I still have time and ambitions to get back, but obviously it’s tough with boys going for the same spot,” says van der Walt.
But, for now, it allows him time to get fully into his new role and he has big plans for the team this year.
“We may have a similar squad (to last year) but I’ll have a different way of approaching things. We will have a set plan of what we want to achieve and how we will achieve it rather going through the motions.
“Before, if things weren’t working out, we would just tend to go with the same thing. This year is a bit different, if things are not working it means you have to change and we have the ability to do it because we have a good core squad and a really strong batting line up.
“Our new pro (Netherlands international Michael Rippon) is also a spin bowler, who bowls left arm wrist spin which not many will have seen and will have a big a role, so hopefully everyone finds their feet because there is plenty of runs and wickets in this squad and if we find that rhythm at the start and start off well, it will set the season up for us going forward.”
Apart from Rippon, who played nine ODIs and 18 T20 internationals for the Dutch, the other newcomer is 19-year-old Jack Egan from Perth in western Australia who, according to van der Walt, “has been exposed at a young age and has a great cricket brain”. He is pencilled in to bat at No 3 against Waringstown tomorrow.
The corresponding match last year saw van der Walt finally score his first century for Carrick — “a huge tick off my back” — although he is not expecting both teams to score 300 tomorrow, as they did last August.
“Unfortunately the pitch won’t be as good as that day, one of the nicest decks I have played on at Carrick,” adds van der Walt.
Elsewhere, after last week’s opening day wash-out, Lisburn hope to get their Premier League defence up and running at the scenic Castle Grounds against Cliftonville Academy while, apart from Carrick, there is another top six match from last year at Stormont between Civil Service North and North Down.