Andrew Puttick, a left-handed opening batsman from Western Province, made his debut in the 2000-01 season, scoring his maiden first-class century in just his third game, against Easterns at Newlands, while still a teenager. Prior to that, Puttick was part of South Africa's squad at the 1999 Under-19 World Cup in Sri Lanka, in the same team as players such as Graeme Smith and Jacques Rudolph. In the early days of his first-class career he averaged nearly fifty and scored an unbeaten 250. That earned him a South Africa A call for the 2003 tour of Sri Lanka, but he struggled to kick on from that level. He earned a full national call-up on another tour of Sri Lanka in 2004 as a replacement for the injured Herschelle Gibbs, but his one international outing to date came as a last-minute replacement in an ODI against New Zealand, at Newlands, in 2005. However, he lasted five balls and failed to get off the mark. Going back to the domestic circuit Puttick continued to be a consistent performer: he contributed to the Cobras' MTN Domestic Championship title-winning campaigns in 2006 and 2007. Puttick also scored well with South Africa A, and replaced the injured Smith as the Cobras' captain in the Champions League Twenty20 in India.