The Proteas and Titans seamer, Lizaad Williams, is en route back to South Africa from the 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup being played in India.

The 30-year-old Williams is returning home for the birth of his child.

Williams only played in the 149-run win against Bangladesh, where he took two wickets.

Williams was initially not selected for the Cricket World Cup, but was called into the squad because of an injury to the seamer, Anrich Nortjé.

At this stage replacement player has not been called up for the squad and this suggests that Williams will be returning to India as soon as he has dealt with his family matters.

Meanwhile, the coach Rob Walter, has said it’s important to put their disappointing 243-run defeat behind them and recover for the next game

“As far as the next four days go, for us it's really about doing what we've done the whole time, using the time we've got available to us to get ready for the next fixture, and then into a semi-final. So, nothing changes there.

“The guys have worked incredibly hard to this point. We worked incredibly hard on our game, invested a huge amount of time into our preparation and so now it's really about just mentally recovering, physically recovering and being ready to compete and compete like we have the whole tournament.”

On Friday the Proteas will face Afghanistan in Ahmedabad in their last round-robin game.

Morgan Piek OFM Sport