The outrageous catching and boundary fielding? Practised. The intense, explosive elegance under pressure? Practised. That no-look six? Practised.

We see Dewald Brevis do outrageous things on a cricket ground. We might think his phenomenal feats come easily to him, that they don't require hours of preparation, application and repetition. If we do think that, we're wrong.

"I train a lot," Brevis said on Saturday. "God blessed me with a talent to play like this. And a lot of hard work comes with it."

Does he enjoy training?

"I do. I see it like, 'How do you become better?' It's about doing the one-percenters and what other people don't do. Whether it's about training or something else, I always want to do those things. Training a lot falls under that."

Brevis was hard at work again during South Africa's net session in Ahmedabad on Friday evening, playing a stroke he has yet to deploy in an international: the switch hit.

"It would be cool to do it at some stage in a match, but it will happen at the right time. It's always fun to face balls left-handed. When me and my brother [Reinardt Brevis] played in the backyard, I would do it sometimes."

The secret garden of his childhood might also be where the no-look six was born. It is unfurled when Brevis sends a straight drive ballooning over the boundary while his chin remains firmly tucked into his sternum. As if he was James Bond ordering another martini without glancing up at the bartender because he needs to keep a steady eye on the villain across the roulette table.

"It's something that has happened naturally from a young age," Brevis said. "Obviously I go out there to enjoy the game and to watch the ball. But it's not forced. If you force things in cricket, that's not where you want to be.

"You want to be in the moment and play subconsciously, and then it just happens. I can't really describe it, but it's quite cool how everyone likes me playing that shot."

You can't see it without being shaken, not stirred, Brevis didn't say.

What he doesn't need to practise is the boldness that shines from his batting.

"Since I was a kid it's how I've played. I love hitting the ball, especially for six. I just want to be myself, and if that means hitting sixes, fours, twos, it will happen. Because I'm going to be myself, no matter how I play."

It's less than three years since Brevis made his senior international debut, in a T20I against Australia at Kingsmead in August 2023, and he completed his all-format collection of caps in an ODI against the Aussies in Cairns in August last year. Yet he seems to have been around forever, which is what happens when you play your first IPL game - in 2022 - 44 days after breaking Shikhar Dhawan's under-19 World Cup runscoring record.

It's also what happens when you are nicknamed Baby AB. Or should that be weighed down by comparisons with AB de Villiers?

"It's always been a privilege and an honour for me because he's my hero," Brevis said. "But I've known since I was young that it's my journey. I'm not someone else."

Indeed. Might this mean, as the years roll by, that de Villiers is referred to as Big Brevis? Hang on. We've got a way to go before we get there. Currently, it's a case of so far, so good.

"It's been a beautiful journey," Brevis said. "I've seen a lot of what cricket has to offer. As there is with everything, there have been highs and lows. I've grown as a player and learnt from a lot of people.

"The main thing is that I'm back to where I was; to how I played when I was 19 and even younger. I went away from that a bit. But now it's all about enjoying it, having fun and being yourself. To being the small boy who really loves playing and just watching the ball and hitting it."

How had he lost sight of his younger self?

"You want to learn, you want to get better. And there are a lot of people with good intentions who want to give you good advice. If you take all of that advice, it's not to say it's going to work for you.

"And then you take away a bit of your natural ability or the person you are. That's what happened. When you focus on being yourself and true to yourself it's amazing to see what happens; how you enjoy the game and how much fun you have and how well you do as well. I found my path back to who I am and to being true to myself and the way I play."

This could come across as an impossibly cute sentiment, but the facts back Brevis up. In 24 T20 innings from January 2023 to March 2024 he scored 803 runs - with three 50s - at a strike rate of 128.54. In 63 innings since he's made 1,780 runs - with two centuries and 10 fifties - at a strike rate of 165.58. That's 37.04 degrees of strike rate difference.

How did it feel to be back in India playing in his first World Cup rather than in the IPL?

"It's not that different, to be honest. India is a great place and I love playing here. The fans are crazy. I love seeing all of them and how loud it gets. It's still a cricket match but it's very special because it's for South Africa."

Watch Brevis play and you need to remind yourself that he is only 22. His maturity at the crease is almost unsettling, his commanding presence that of someone far older. Hear him speak and it's clear, in the best way, that he is a young man. He is not at all a poor talker, but he speaks with a twentysomething's carefulness and shows a healthy deference towards people who have been in the game since long before he was alive.

He needs, maybe, to grow into his fame. Unlike the way he is on a cricket ground, where he betrays no lack of surety, Brevis can seem less than certain in person. Like when he has to cast about for the correct Afrikaans cricket term - South Africa has 11 official languages, but the game's lingua franca is English.

"I'm 100% Afrikaans," he says with a hint of frustration. As he does so, and unlike what he sometimes does when he hits a cricket ball, he looks you straight in the eye.