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Birrell Builds Fearsome Pace Cartel for Sunrisers 2027

Sunrisers Eastern Cape kept their pace attack and added Burger and Overton at base price. Birrell calls pace the X-factor.

By Saleem Sial · 15 Oct 2026

Sunrisers Eastern Cape have built their three titles on bowling, and head coach Adrian Birrell has doubled down for Season 5. The defending champions kept their pace attack together and then added two more fast bowlers at the auction, both at base price. Birrell calls pace an enormous X-factor, and the squad he has assembled backs the claim: it is the deepest collection of quicks in the league.

The retained core starts with Marco Jansen, who has 60 wickets in four seasons, one short of Ottneil Baartman's all-time SA20 record. Anrich Nortje took 18 wickets in the Season 4 title run alone, and Adam Milne and Lutho Sipamla give Birrell two more international-standard options. Keeping four quicks of that quality was the first part of the plan; the auction was the second.

Nandre Burger and Craig Overton were the additions, and both arrived at base price. Overton's value is his range: like Jansen, he is a seam bowler who can bat, which gives Birrell a like-for-like option if the first-choice attack needs rest or cover. Burger, 31 and formerly of Joburg Super Kings, adds experience and a different angle to a group that already had plenty of speed.

Burger's fitness was the question the franchise had to answer before bidding. He missed the 2026 Major League Cricket season with Texas Super Kings in June after a recurrence of a lumbar stress reaction, and any signing with that history needs checking. Sunrisers did their background work and concluded he should be fit for the tournament, which turned a risk into a base-price opportunity.

The attack gets its first test in the biggest possible game: the season opener against Pretoria Capitals at St George's Park on Sunday 17 January 2027, a rematch of the Season 4 final. Birrell has won three titles in four seasons with this franchise, and the pace cartel is his bet for a fourth. If Jansen passes Baartman's record along the way, it will be a footnote to a larger plan, not the plan itself. The depth also protects Birrell against the shape of the season: ten league games in under a month, including double-header weekends, means no attack survives on four bowlers alone, and a group of six quicks lets him rotate without weakening the side. Burger and Overton give him that cover at base price, which is why the auction mattered as much as the retentions.

Source: https://www.sa20.co.za/news/birrell-assembles-fearsome-x-factor-pace-cartel-for-sunrisers