Ken Borland

While a lengthy labour court battle lies in store for former CEO Thabang Moroe, the Cricket South Africa Board have more battles to fight this week after a group calling themselves Cricket United 2020 demanded that they consult them in any transformation policies and the Social Justice Network mechanism set up recently.

Cricket United 2020 is made up of the 40 black former Proteas cricketers and senior coaches who held a meeting with the CSA Board at the end of last month, but they released a statement on Wednesday night asking CSA to adhere to their agreement from that meeting to properly engage with the concerned Black stakeholders.

“We request that CSA adhere to the commitment to allow engagement and consultation with us and the relevant decision makers at CSA, namely the Board, CEO, Director of Cricket and relevant Proteas team management within the next 7 days. We are not here to break the system, it is already broken. Subsequently, following the process outlined by that commitment by the president and board we were alerted that the Transformation Policy had been signed off by the Board without any consultation with relevant coaches, ex-players, current players and other roleplayers,” the statement read.

Unfortunately CSA were in no place to respond publicly to Cricket United 2020 on Thursday because the Board was embroiled in an all-day meeting to decide the fate of Moroe, who was suspended last December. The former CEO was supposed to present his case to the Board on Thursday but it seems unlikely he bothered because he had instructed lawyers to prepare an indictment the night before to stop the board meeting.

It seems likely that the Board will dismiss Moroe, who will then take his case to the CCMA and ultimately labour court. But CSA have shown they are quite prepared to spend thousands dragging these matters through litigation until the complainant’s money runs out. It will also give them a handy excuse to delay making the forensic audit public, because many believe they are implicated in Moroe’s wrongdoing as well.

The one statement that did emerge on Thursday came from Director of Cricket Graeme Smith, who responded to allegations of racism made against him when he was the Proteas captain from 2002/3 to 2013/14.

“I should emphasise that I was never in charge of selections. I had an opinion as the captain, but the casting vote was with the coach and the selectors. In the case of the 2012 tour to England, which Thami Tsolekile has alluded to, there was a whole panel of selectors. Thami was in the squad as reserve ‘keeper and this was communicated to him on both the England and Australia tours by Gary Kirsten.

“It was international sport and there were some very tough decisions made. Decisions which I have been on the undesired side of myself. I was left out on the brink of the 2003 World Cup, having played the whole year before that; I was left out of a Test team and Ashwell Prince flown up to play ahead of me. I felt I still had more to give in ODI cricket when I was dropped. It hurt, but I had to knuckle down and accept it.

“Over time, I have grown to understand that it was the right call for the team. And that has always been the crux of the decisions made in my time, they were the best for the team. I have tried my level best to explain the decisions that I have made in my time as captain and I am happy to engage in discussions in the right forum, even if it is uncomfortable because I think we can only learn from our past,” Smith said.