Ken Borland

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.

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Joint defending champions, the Nashua Cape Cobras will be anxiously awaiting the fitness of four key players before they begin their Momentum One-Day Cup campaign against the Chevrolet Knights in Kimberley on Saturday.

Ace spinner Dane Piedt has had an operation on the shoulder he injured in the Champions League in India and will be out of action for six weeks, while Justin Kemp (broken hand), Rory Kleinveldt (knee) and regular captain Justin Ontong (back) are all in a race against time to be fit. Key pace bowler Beuran Hendricks is also a long-term absentee due to a stress fracture in his back.

Veteran Robin Peterson will be leading the side in the absence of Ontong and he says they will have to plan carefully due to the disruption.

“We’re struggling with a few injuries and therefore how to balance the side, which is going to make it tough up front in the competition. We’ll maybe have to blood a few more youngsters, it’s a bit of a changing of the guard, but we need to be mindful that the main reason we’ve been more successful than the other franchises recently is probably because we’re more experienced than the rest. When you have six or seven senior players, it makes it easier to bring in a couple of youngsters,” Peterson said.

The Knights will come into the game bursting with confidence after winning their opening two Sunfoil Series games to top the log and they will be fielding an in-form pace bowling trio in Corne Dry, Quinton Friend and the seasoned Dillon du Preez.

Captain Werner Coetsee will also be crucial, however, with his off-spinners and the 31-year-old has a fine record in limited-overs cricket, with both bat and ball.

“Wickets are what stop momentum, we will be trying to get them any way we can. Our bowlers are all in exciting form and we have plans during the fielding restrictions that we hope will give us the edge,” Coetsee said.

The Knights batting line-up, having lost Morne van Wyk, Dean Elgar, Ryan McLaren and Johan van der Wath, does not have many familiar names, but Rudi Second and Gihahn Cloete already have centuries to their name this season.

“There’s been a lot of talk about us losing our senior players, but the first two games have shown the responsibility of the batsmen. It does a lot for your self-confidence to win those matches and now we want to start well in the one-day competition and play consistent, disciplined cricket,” Coetsee said.

The Chevrolet Warriors, meanwhile, will be doing battle with the bizhub Highveld Lions in Potchefstroom on Sunday and will probably have to do so without Proteas star Wayne Parnell, who is still recovering from a shoulder injury.

With Coetsee spinning the Lions to defeat at the same venue last weekend, the Warriors are likely to attack the hosts with spin.

“Spin is massively important for us, ever since we had Robin Peterson, Johan Botha and Nicky Boje in the team, it’s something we’ve developed. Jon-Jon Smuts did a huge job for us last season and Simon Harmer proves himself every season,” Warriors captain Colin Ingram said.

With one batsman’s spot probably still open in the World Cup squad, Ingram said he would love to go to cricket’s showpiece event again, having travelled with the Proteas to India and Bangladesh in 2011.

“The World Cup is always at the back of your mind, but you have to prove yourself as a player at franchise level, so it’s really important for me to focus on the Warriors. International cricket has pressure of its own and it grew my game. I would definitely love to go again,” Ingram said.

The South African women’s cricket team’s rise from sixth to third in the international rankings is undoubtedly rooted in the better opportunities they now have since being sponsored by Momentum and Mignon du Preez’s side is off on tour again this weekend as they head to Sri Lanka for four ODIs and three T20s.

The women’s Proteas are battle-hardened from their tough tour of world number ones England last month and will want to show how far they have advanced from this time last year when they hosted Sri Lanka and won both the ODI and T20 series.

“We played brilliantly against them here at home, but it’s going to be a different ball game playing them now in their home conditions. Ideally, we want to make sure we improve on those results because it’s the start of the ICC Women’s Challenge and the points are important for us to finish in the top four and automatically qualify for the 2017 World Cup. So it’s one of our most important tours,” captain Du Preez told The Citizen yesterday.

Talented all-rounder Sune Luus has withdrawn from the South African squad because she will be writing her matric exams, but off-spinner Yolani Fourie, the captain of the SA Emerging Players team, has been called up for the first time by the senior side.

The responsibility will now fall on young Dane’ van Niekerk to be the main leg-spinner in the team, but Du Preez believes the pace bowlers will be the strength of the South Africans.

“The Sri Lankans are used to spin, they’ve often played two seamers and five spinners against us, so spin is what they know. But they’re not so used to the speed we can produce and I think our amazing seamers can do something special against them, plus we have swing bowlers too who can move the ball both ways,” Du Preez said.

The women’s Proteas arrive on the sub-continental island on Sunday and the first ODI is on Wednesday at the Sinhalese Sports Club.

Squad: Bernadine Bezuidenhout, Trisha Chetty, Moseline Daniels, Mignon du Preez, Yolani Fourie, Shabnim Ismail, Marizanne Kapp, Ayabonga Khaka, Lizelle Lee, Matshipi Letsoalo, Nadine Moodley, Andrie Steyn, Chloe Tryon, Dane’ van Niekerk.

Whatever people say about going to Benoni, Willowmoore Park is rapidly becoming a field of dreams for the Unlimited Titans players with Roelof van der Merwe and Rowan Richards adding to the list of phenomenal individual performances there in the Sunfoil Series victory over the Chevrolet Warriors over the weekend.

Van der Merwe turned his maiden first-class century into a double, scoring 205 not out as the Titans amassed 539 for six in their first innings. Left-arm paceman Richards then took five for 31 as the Titans dismissed the Warriors for the second time with just a dozen overs remaining in the match. His final spell was a phenomenal 5.4-3-2-5 and included a hat-trick to end the match.

It is only the fourth time that a double century and a hat-trick have been scored in the same first-class match in South Africa and the second time it has happened at Willowmoore Park. The other occasion was the famous match in 1948/49 when Denis Compton blazed a triple century for the English tourists in 181 minutes against North-Eastern Transvaal, with seamer Cliff Gladwin then taking a hat-trick.

Last season, Shaun von Berg blasted the fastest century – off 73 balls – in franchise four-day history for the Titans against the Cape Cobras in Benoni.

Van der Merwe has always been one of the hardest workers in the Titans team and the dramatic improvement in his batting – he was their leading run-scorer in last season’s Sunfoil Series and averaged 55.57 – has been the reward.

“It’s all about the way you train in the nets and it’s just mental really. My target is to face a hundred balls, it’s a simple thing, but often scoring a fifty isn’t enough to get you there,” Van der Merwe said of his improvement.

“The way the Titans’ set-up is now, Shaun von Berg is the number one spinner for four-day cricket and the only way I can be sure of playing is by being a batsman. I’ve become almost a part-time bowler if you like, but that’s how I stay in the side, through scoring runs and my bowling is an extra,” the left-arm spinner said.

The Titans batsmen have struggled for consistency in recent times and coach Rob Walter has often stressed the importance of scoring centuries. It was typical Bulldog Roelof for him to go and make that first hundred of the season a double!

“We have struggled over the past few seasons to make big scores, so it was a good start in Benoni. I was very stressed going to a hundred for the first time, I felt sure something was going to go wrong again in the 90s, but I was able to play with freedom after that,” Van der Merwe, whose previous highest score was 93 against the Highveld Lions in 2010, said.

The Titans have been waiting for Richards to find his best form after a long-term injury lay-off, and the 30-year-old hit his straps in spectacular fashion as he wrecked the Warriors’ brave effort to save the game.

“It’s my first hat-trick and it makes it really special that it won the game and gave me a five-for,” Richards said after his career-best figures in the Sunfoil Series.

“I knew it would be my last spell of the day, so I just pushed it and made sure I hit good areas. There had been a lot of effort before me by the other seamers, JP de Villiers and Ethy Mbhalati, that broke the long partnership between Colin Ingram and Ryan Bailey, and we just said that another wicket would bring more breakthroughs. We never gave up and I found my rhythm at the right time.”