Rassie van der Dussen: MI Cape Town enters the season with confidence as defending champions

MI Cape Town batter Rassie van der Dussen says they are going into the season with a weight lifted off their shoulders having won the competition last season.

MI Cape Town are heading into the season as defending champions, having beat Sunrisers Eastern Cape in the final at the Wanderers in Johannesburg last season.

One would assume that the side would head into the upcoming season with added pressure to defend their title, however, Van der Dussen believes they have very little pressure going into the season.

In fact, the 36-year-old told Independent Media that they actually felt more pressure in seasons one, two and three, as they finished last place in the opening two seasons, despite having a strong squad.

“I think we actually play with little bit less pressure having won last year,” Van der Dussen said.

“Last year we were under real pressure having finished last twice with a really strong squad every time. Last year we managed to pull it together. I think it will be good for us.

“When you have a good team, there's always pressure on you to win, but we have won now.”

MI Cape Town will take on Aiden Markram’s Durban Super Giants in the season opener at Newlands in Cape Town on Boxing Day.

Both teams have strong squads and Van der Dussen reckons this season will be quite the spectacle.

“I think the beauty of SA20 is that all the teams are ridiculously strong. I'm going to say it's the strongest league in the world,” Van der Dussen said.

“According to me it's definitely stronger than the IPL and definitely stronger than any of the leagues.

“Just because of the fact that there's only six teams and there's so many international and South African stars that you need to try to squeeze into that. That's the beauty of it.

“It’s going to be a tough game against Durban. Their squad is also looking unbelievably strong.

“As a spectator I can think it's going to be really exciting to see the strength versus strength format. Like I said, I think the league is just getting stronger and stronger every year.”

Van der Dussen says that he is in good touch having had time in the middle in the Cricket South Africa T20 Challenge last month.

“I'm feeling pretty good. I think before that CSA T20 I felt a bit rusty. The last time I played was probably in the CPL for Barbados before that. You can be in the nets all you want but giving that game time is important to get your rhythm going,” he said.

“I think I'm lucky at the Lions to have Hashim as our batting coach and also at MI Cape Town. It makes it easy, the consistency of the talk and the coaching makes it easy.

“I spoke to Hash about a few things, he said this is what you're doing when you're playing well type of thing. It didn't take me too long to get it back up and going.

“I'm heading to Cape Town later this week. I should have at least a week of good prep and then hit the ground running on the 26th.”