Ken Borland

Cricket will return to South Africa on Saturday as a new format of the game debuts at SuperSport Park in Centurion when 3TCricket is launched with a match between three teams featuring the best local talent available, and the Proteas’ No.1 limited-overs spinner Tabraiz Shamsi believes it will not only add a fun new dimension to the game but also broaden the thinking of cricketers.

3TCricket involves three teams of eight competing with each other at the same time, with each team batting for six overs against each opponent. A total of 36 overs – 12 overs per side – will be played after the action gets underway, broadcast live by SuperSport, from 11am.

The players had a practice game on Thursday and Shamsi said there was confusion at first but they had ultimately enjoyed the experience and he sees future prospects for the format.

“With all the different rules we didn’t know what to expect and it was confusing at first. But it’s exciting and none of the players had anything negative to say about it. I just see it basically as you bat and bowl twice, six overs an innings. It brings a different way of seeing things tactically, like with the team with the worst score after the first innings batting last second time round, so they are still in the game.

“The format gets us thinking in other ways which can only be good. When T20 started, people were thinking it was a joke, just go out there and hit the ball, but now we see there is so much strategy in T20 cricket. Having not played for four months, you can’t expect the players to be at the levels they would normally be at, but hopefully this format does see more matches because it is fun,” Shamsi told Saturday Citizen on Friday.

Even though spinners have subsequently become key weapons in T20 cricket, Shamsi said 3TCricket is going to be tough for all bowlers but especially his slow-bowling ilk.

“It’s going to be very difficult for bowlers, especially spinners, and especially at SuperSport Park where it has traditionally been very hard to defend. There are only six fielders so of course you are going to go for runs. In our practice match teams were scoring 80-90 runs per six overs, so as a spinner if you’re going for 15-runs-an over I think you’re doing okay.

“I think the best strategy is to try and take wickets because batsmen can only bat once between the two games, so they also have to be a bit careful. The best way is still to strike because you probably won’t be able to defend anyway because there are so many gaps in the field. And bowling only three overs makes it hard too because as a spinner you only get in your groove after an over or two,” Shamsi said.

Squads

Kites: Quinton de Kock (captain), Temba Bavuma, Jon-Jon Smuts, David Miller, Dwaine Pretorius, Anrich Nortje, Beuran Hendricks, Lutho Sipamla. Coach – Wandile Gwavu.

Kingfishers: Reeza Hendricks, Janneman Malan, Faf du Plessis, Heinrich Klaasen (captain), Gerald Coetzee, Thando Ntini, Glenton Stuurman, Tabraiz Shamsi. Coach – Mignon du Preez.

Eagles: Aiden Markram, Rassie van der Dussen, AB de Villiers (captain), Kyle Verreynne, Andile Phehlukwayo, Bjorn Fortuin, Junior Dala, Lungi Ngidi. Coach – Geoffrey Toyana.

By a quick calculation, former Northerns cricketer Anton Ferreira has contributed more than 40 years of service to cricket in the province and in South Africa, so it was entirely fitting that the Titans franchise should pay tribute to him when they launched their new refurbished president’s lounge at SuperSport Park on Thursday night.

Ferreira, a quality all-rounder who would go on to represent South Africa in unofficial limited-overs matches in the 1980s, was born in Pretoria and made his debut for Northern Transvaal in 1974. When he retired in 1992, he held the record for most appearances for the province (93 first-class games) and the most runs scored for Northern Transvaal (4290 in first-class cricket).

Ferreira was one of the key figures in the rise of Northern Transvaal from the B Section to A Section contenders in the early 1980s, also taking 235 wickets at an average of 26.91 with his muscular pace bowling.

After his playing days, which included an eight-year stint with Warwickshire, where he was immensely popular, Ferreira went into coaching and just kept on contributing. He initially made his mark at junior and first-class level (with Transvaal) and then took the South African U19 team to two junior world cups. In 2000, he was appointed Cricket South Africa’s director of coaching, which involved a shift into coaching the coaches.

This month, with his job description having evolved into coaching education manager, Ferreira finally retired from CSA, although he is still involved in cricket on a consultancy basis, currently helping the Africa Cricket Association.

“Yogi has done it all in cricket, he has made an incredible contribution to the game, and was one of the people who laid the foundation for our current success as a franchise. What he has done for cricket in this area and around the country during his 18 years with Cricket South Africa has been phenomenal and his passion for the game is what sets him apart. And it was all done without any tendency for self-promotion, you won’t find a more humble, down-to-earth man,” Titans CEO Jacques Faul said in paying tribute to Ferreira.

A typically modest Ferreira said he can never repay the game for all it has given him.

“I am humbled and I can never repay the game for all the wonderful enjoyment it has given me. I learnt, as a young boy, about the game from Northern Transvaal legends like Denis Lindsay, Jackie Botten and Tiger Lance and they taught me about enjoying the pleasure of risk,” Ferreira said.

Ferreira will certainly be missed by Cricket South Africa, but someone with his passion for the game is certainly still going to be around, bringing a smile and wonderful insight to cricket.

Golf tournaments are probably second only to weddings when it comes to people questioning whether all the expense is justified, but the City of Tshwane on Tuesday revealed some impressive figures in terms of the return on investment in the Tshwane Open, which was being launched at Pretoria Country Club.

This year’s event will be held from February 11-14 and will be the first of at least two more stagings of the co-sanctioned event in Tshwane, with the city council having renewed their contract and the prizemoney being increased to R18.5 million.

Lee-Anne Bac, a researcher at Grant Thornton who was hired by the City of Tshwane to measure the impact of staging the tournament, said the benefit to the economy over the last two years has been around R140 million, with R39 million direct spend in Tshwane, while Repucom, the sports marketing and sponsorships experts, say the exposure the Tshwane Open received last year was worth more than $8 million.

As Selwyn Nathan, the executive director of the Sunshine Tour, pointed out: “Tshwane haven’t had to pay millions for their name change from Pretoria, like Datsun did when they changed to Nissan, because in the four years of this tournament, hundreds of people every day are asking ‘Where is Tshwane?’ and googling it.”

“The Tshwane Open has exposed our brand to 230 million households around the globe, which can only help grow our economy. People ask why we don’t just spend R30 million on supplying basic services, but the more enduring solution to our socio-economic problems is to grow the economy. Just dishing out social grants won’t work and we need to free people from relying on the state to make them succeed,” Kgosientso Ramokgopa, the executive mayor of the city, said at Tuesday’s launch.

George Coetzee will be back to defend his title on the course he grew up on, while Charl Schwartzel will make a welcome return to action having missed the SA and Joburg Opens due to a virulent stomach virus.

But the new guard of South African golf is making its presence felt and Brandon Stone, Haydn Porteous, Zander Lombard and Christiaan Bezuidenhout will all be teeing it up at Pretoria Country Club.

“I would like to see George win again because he’s been a great ambassador for us, but Zander and Christiaan were runners-up in the two previous co-sanctioned events and Brandon, Charl and Haydn have already been winners this year. If someone new wins, then it provides great opportunity for them with a two-year exemption on the European Tour. It’s a stepping stone to competing internationally and making a name for themselves,” Nathan said.

The Springboks versus All Blacks rugby Test at Ellis Park last weekend counted as one of the greatest sports events I have been to and I felt immensely proud not just because our national rugby team won, but also because of the way they played and the way they carried themselves after the long-awaited triumph over their greatest rivals.

Even if one is not impressed by the way New Zealand and South Africa are steering rugby in a bright new direction of high-tempo play, the wonderful spirit shown between the two teams and the obviously high respect they hold each other in, must gladden the heart of all who love sport for the character-building effects it can have.

The wonderful gesture made by the All Blacks in Wellington when Richie McCaw handed over gifts to Bryan Habana and Jean de Villiers for playing their 100^th Tests will live long in the memory. The fact that nothing of that sort happened in Australia probably says more about the special relationship between the Springboks and All Blacks rather than any deficiencies on the Wallabies’ part.

But if the Springboks are going to win over even more hearts and minds – it is clear that still not everyone in South Africa believes they represent them – then perhaps they should take a leaf out of the book of their cricket counterparts who launched their ProteaFire campaign this week to some fanfare.

A huge part of the Proteas’ success in recent years has been due to the calibre of people in the team – the likes of Graeme Smith, Hashim Amla, AB de Villiers, Faf du Plessis, JP Duminy, Dale Steyn, Ryan McLaren, Morne Morkel and Vernon Philander are all fantastic human beings – and the Springboks also have some fantastic leaders of men in their ranks, Jean de Villiers, Victor Matfield, Tendai Mtawarira, Adriaan Strauss, Duane Vermeulen, Francois Louw, Bryan Habana and JP Pietersen springing readily to mind.

Rugby will be facing their own World Cup challenge next year, but they will also be tested off the field with sponsors cutting back and transformation issues still bedevilling them.

Whether ProteaFire will help the cricketers finally win their World Cup remains to be seen but what is certain is that most of the population will be firmly behind them.

ProteaFire emphasises the importance of putting the team ahead of the individual and the concept of Ubuntu is a key part of Graeme Smith’s vision that started in 2007. Cricket is often, because of its tradition of statistics, a very individual game and one would have thought rugby, perhaps the greatest of team sports, would have been quicker to implement this sort of mission statement of what playing for the national side really means.

For the cricketers, their diversity will be their strength and rugby probably isn’t quite there yet.

Another important aspect of ProteaFire is that it is almost a contract the national team have signed with their supporters in terms of what is expected of them, on and off the field. As Hashim Amla pointed out, this does not mean treating players like babies.

“On the field, emotions can run high and nobody’s perfect. It’s not about having 15 saints, everybody’s different and it’s about getting the strengths of all 15 players together and dealing with any fallouts,” Amla said.

One cannot help but come to the conclusion that the current turmoil wreaking havoc in English cricket is born out of their failure to deal properly with issues of team culture and identity.

Kevin Pietersen can be a brat, but there have been difficult cricketers before who have been allowed to enjoy the middle of the spotlight while still contributing to the team success.

Last Saturday night at Ellis Park and Thursday night in the SuperSport studios were two proud evenings because it showed South African sports teams are getting it right.