Johannes Albertus Morkel (born 10 June 1981), better known as Albie Morkel, is a former South African cricketer. He is an all-rounder who bowls right-arm medium fast and bats left-handed. He was earmarked as the new Lance Klusener from an early age and is famous for his six hitting abilities. Albie has a younger brother, Morné Morkel, who also played international cricket for South Africa while his father Albert played provincial cricket in South Africa. He has a particularly impressive first class record, with a batting average of 44.0 and a bowling average of 29.0. In January 2019, he retired from all forms of cricket. Currently he is the assistant coach of the Namibia national cricket team which qualified for 2020 ICC T20 World Cup in Australia on 29th Oct 2019. Career First-class His bowling was quite impressive in his first seasons in first class cricket, as he burst onto the scene with six for 36 for Easterns against Griqualand West, but in the 2004/05 season he was expected to take more of the bowling effort for the Titans, but took only 20 wickets at a bowling average of 40.65. However, that coincided with an improvement in his batting, as he made his first double century of his career, with 204 not out against Western Province Boland. During the 2008 summer season Morkel played for Durham County Cricket Club in the North East of England along with fellow South African Shaun Pollock mainly in the Twenty20 Cup competition. He was dropped from the national team for the tour of the West indies, opening the door for David Miller and others. In 2012, Morkel was confirmed as Somerset's second overseas player alongside Chris Gayle. Roelof van der Merwe was expected to be retained by Somerset but it was expected that a work permit would not be granted. He joined Derbyshire in 2013 as an overseas player for their Friends Life t20 campaign. International His statistics on his international debut tour to New Zealand were not very impressive, as he got two wickets at the cost of 48 runs apiece, but he did get five wickets quite cheaply on Zimbabwe's tour of South Africa. Nevertheless, Morkel was picked for the Africa squad to play Asia in the 2005 Afro-Asia Cup, but withdrew due to injury. He appeared however for Africa the following series, in 2007, and made history in the second game