Prince EWS
Global Moderator
Rudolph started his first class career as a bowling allrounder, batting between 7 and 9.I think Rudolph was batting at the top of the order at the very start of his First-Class career. Camps was the one who first showed me it (I'd always presumed he was a middle-order batsman in every respect) so he'd probably be best to re-examine the issue TBH.
Case in point.
By the time he got selected for Northerns' first choice team, he was a batting allrounder and batted around 5, before eventually being thrust up to open as the team was in a similar situation to South Africa now with little specialist candidates. He did well there, though, and was picking South Africa to bat at #3 based almost exclusively on what he had done opening the batting. He never opened for Yorkshire, though, and I'm pretty sure he hasn't opened in Franchise cricket since it started. Despite doing it quite a bit in his FC career, I don't think it's his preference as he never does it if they are other options.