It didn’t take long before Notts fans and the local press had given Paterson the obvious but well-earned soubriquet ‘The Great Dane’. He took three wickets in each innings for his first First-Class game for the county (v Warwickshire) and once Stuart Broad had returned to the England camp, formed a potent opening attack with the redoubtable Luke Fletcher.
Dane Paterson finished the season with 54 First-Class wickets at just 17.98 and one five-wicket haul, also against Warwickshire in the return fixture. With eight wickets in T20 Blast games and a similar number in List-A matches, his 2021 performances were more than sufficient for Nottinghamshire to immediately renew his contract. That faith was fully justified as he followed up that debut season with fifty or more Championship wickets in both 2022 and 2023.
“Dane is a player who relishes the battle”, said Peter Moores, announcing the new contract, “It's a credit to him that he bought into the club's culture and understood what it meant to play for Notts”.
Paterson said: “It is an honour to represent Nottinghamshire, and to have the opportunity to return for 2022 is really exciting,”
“I’m grateful for the chance to spend another season in and around a great bunch of people at Trent Bridge.
“The way they accepted me at the club is something I won’t forget, and I can’t wait to get back together with them again to have a red hot crack at some silverware in 2022.”
Paterson, born in Cape Town, South Africa on 4 April 1989, came to Trent Bridge with a good reputation from his games with Western Province and Cape Cobras.
Full international honours arrived when he made his T20I debut for South Africa in the final match of a three-game series against Sri Lanka in January 2017 at his home ground of Newlands in Cape Town.
He has since gone on to represent his country in seven further T20Is, four ODIs, and two Tests, with his debut in the longest format coming against England in January 2020; a year that later saw him ruled out of playing for a concerted period with a pectoral injury.
Domestically, he has also played for the Paarl Rocks in South Africa’s Mzansi Super League T20 tournament, finishing as the side’s joint-leading wicket-taker in the competition’s inaugural edition in 2018
November 2023
See Dane Paterson's career stats here
Nottinghamshirr First-Class Number 663