Exclusive: How a Car Accident Set David Bedingham Up for a Long and Successful Career After a Year on the Sidelines

Having been involved in a car crash that kept him from playing for a year, Proteas Batter David Bedingham believes that it shaped him to be the dominant batter that he currently is. 

DELAYED DREAMS

We all grew up dreaming of making a success of ourselves at a relatively young age. Some grow up dreaming of representing their country in their teens or early twenties, and as much as some get to live in their dreams, most never make their dreams a reality, at least not like they had dreamt about them. 

Proteas batter David Bedingham is one of those guys whose dreams of playing for South Africa in his early twenties just never happened. 

Though he is a prodigy with bat in hand, an effortlessly aesthetic stroke maker, Bedingham only got to make his international debut at 29 years of age, a total opposite to what he dreamt of as a young boy growing up in Cape Town. 

For some prodigies, your Kagiso Rabada's and Quinton de Kock's of this world, things happen for them at a very young age, and they go on to earn their Test caps in their early twenties.

On the other hand, Bedingham had to ride the ups and downs of life and walk the longer, tougher path to making his childhood dream of playing Test cricket a reality. 

Growing up in Cape Town where there is a strong competition for spots in the Western Province team, Bedingham struggled to break into professional cricket after high school.

"Coming from under-19 cricket, I expected things to happen quickly, I expected to play for Western Province straight away and go on to play for my country at 23 but I struggled," Bedingham told SportsBoom.com. 

MOVING FROM CAPE TOWN TO STELLENBOSCH

He had to leave Cape Town and enrolled for a degree at Stellenbosch University (Matties) where he made new friends, lived like a normal young man enjoying the company of friends and eventually stopped obsessing about breaking into professional cricket.

That's when he started enjoying his cricket, and naturally, runs started coming. 

"I then went to Matties and started having a better all-round life," said Bedingham. "I started studying, having friends and it wasn't all about cricket. I think that definitely helped."

THE ACCIDENT AND THE HARDSHIPS

Just when it seemed that he had turned his career around, he was involved in a car accident on an extremely hot day in Stellenbosch.

After a few rounds of golf with friends in one of the picturesque courses in Stellenbosch under the searing heat, Bedingham decided to call it a day due to the sheer heat.

After dropping off his friends and driving back to his residence, Bedingham fell asleep at the wheel and sadly got into an accident, one that would keep him out of the cricket field for a year.

It was after that accident, upon returning to playing again, that his career took.

"The accident happened, I was out for a year and straight after that year things just started happening. I started scoring a lot more runs, started putting less pressure on myself and things just kicked off," he said.

"I had a good season with Boland and got called to a net session with Western Province and Ashwell Prince was there and I had a decent net session. In the next three weeks, I was signed for Western Province."

It was all the ups and downs that shaped the 30-year-old to be the batter that he is at the moment, a batter with an unmatched hunger for runs.

In the past three County Championship seasons with Durham, Bedingham has scored over 3000 runs with 13 centuries in his name, a record that is almost unheard of.

Bedingham emphasised that the hardships that he has had to go through in his life have shaped him to be where he is in his career

"All the hardships, if you can get through them, it makes you a stronger person, and if you're a stronger person you'll be a stronger cricketer," he said.