David Wiese

If Bangladesh is the land of left-arm spinners, then South Africa is known for its pace bowling allrounders. David Wiese falls into that category. A right-arm medium pacer and a handy lower-order bat, Wiese took up cricket late but made his debut for Eastern province at the age of 20.

He struggled with the rigors of first class cricket and could not seal a permanent place in the side. However, with time he grew and matured into an allrounder that South Africa were looking for after the retirement of Jacques Kallis in 2013-14. Wiese was on the tour to Sri Lanka in 2013 and made his debut in a T20 game, but after only three matches, he was sent back to sharpen his skills.

The season of 2014-15 was the best in Wiese's career. He played a vital role with ball and bat as Knights went on to win the domestic one-day competition. Wiese was recalled to the national side and made his ODI debut as well in 2015.

Wiese had the uncanny knack to vary the pace of his deliveries that helped him succeed in the shortest form of the game. The subtle changes in pace brought him career best figures - 5 for 23 against West Indies which are second best for a South African.

Consistent performances for the national side got him a ticket to the World T20 in India, where South Africa were expected to win. However, like previous ICC tournaments they found themselves unable to qualify for the knockouts.

There are plenty of other franchise teams for which Wiese has turned up, notably Barbados Tridents and Guyana Amazon Warriors in the Caribbean Premier League, while in the NatWest T20 Blast he represented Sussex. He was also picked by Benoni Zalmi in the inaugural Global T20 League draft.

Wiese was picked by the Indian Premier League franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore in 2015 and in his first match, he picked up four wickets and scored 47, but still could not prevent defeat. He stayed with the club for two seasons before they let him go in 2017.

The lanky all-rounder was picked by Kolkata Knight Riders in IPL 2023 auctions for his base price of 1 crore. However, with the presence of other quality all-rounders in the team like Andre Russell, Sunil Narine and Shakib Al Hasan, it will be interesting to see if Wiese can break it through in the the playing XI owing to the restrictions on the number of overseas players.