Ken Borland

Former Proteas captain Faf du Plessis was left out of the tour to the West Indies because he has no contract in place with Cricket South Africa, but negotiations are underway to possibly add him to the squad for the T20 matches that begin on June 26, Rapport can reveal.

While Du Plessis has retired from Test cricket and is generally considered a free agent these days, due to the current policies in place, if he had gone on tour to the West Indies he would have received no remuneration for the tour save for match fees, which are little more than a top-up for those players who are on contracts.

With the number of free agents only likely to increase with the rise of lucrative T20 leagues, it is a gap in CSA’s contracting system which director of cricket Graeme Smith is trying to fix in consultation with the South African Cricketers Association (the players’ union).

In the meantime, there is a chance that Du Plessis, who showed that he is still one of South Africa’s best T20 batsman with his strong showing in the suspended IPL, could reignite his T20 World Cup hopes by playing in the West Indies. For that to happen, the national selectors would have to agree to add him to the squad and Du Plessis would have to agree to special financial terms CSA will offer. The organisation budgeted for 17 national men’s contracts for the season but only awarded 16 of them, and the some of the money from that extra ‘salary’ is believed to be on offer for Du Plessis.

While there has been some talk of the selectors adopting a hardline stance to free agents going forward, to his credit convenor Victor Mpitsang cast a balanced tone with Rapport on Friday.

“It’s a no-brainer, Faf is still a helluva player and he has a wonderful record in T20 cricket. He’s not out of the World Cup running, but about a month ago it was decided that all free agents need to play domestically a bit as well to be chosen for the Proteas. People always talk about the West Indies and all their free agents, but they all come back and play in the Caribbean Premier League. We need to be fair in our system,” Mpitsang said.

The current policy for the contracting of Proteas sees the players ranked from No.1 to No.16, depending on the balance of Test, ODI and T20 matches in the next season, using scientific data methods. But free agents, who fall outside of that system, are what one CSA official described as “the elephant in the room that everyone has been avoiding”.

It’s another problem that Smith has inherited as director of cricket and issues like the one with Du Plessis are going to happen more and more. Checks and balances obviously need to be in place to ensure the free agents are not just using the Proteas to score lucrative T20 contracts elsewhere, but are actually contributing to the national team’s culture and success.

There is also the danger that if players are given format-specific contracts, then many could opt out of Test cricket and just play the white-ball formats.

On the other hand, the Proteas need to have marquee players that the top teams want to play against and that people want to watch in action, developing a strong team is obviously a key strategic objective of CSA.

Other prominent free agents who are not currently playing for the Proteas in T20 cricket are AB de Villiers, Imran Tahir and Chris Morris. It has been the same old story with De Villiers, with the superstar batsman seemingly poised for a comeback at the World Cup before once again pulling out, while the actual availability of Morris seems to be a point of contention.

The Proteas seem content to allow Tahir to drift into retirement and continue with Tabraiz Shamsi and their other orthodox spinners.

But there certainly seems to be a gap in the Proteas’ inexperienced batting line-up when it comes to Du Plessis, who has expressed his desire to keep playing through to the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia. The 36-year-old declined to comment on why he was not initially chosen for the Caribbean tour, but did confirm it was a contractual issue.

Free agents are a tough issue to handle in a way that ensures fairness for those players who are 100% involved in South African cricket, but the future success of the Proteas demands that CSA, the selectors and SACA somehow get on the same page and come up with an accord that allows these stars to still have some sort of contractual arrangement with CSA.

And in the short-term, gets Faf to the West Indies.

The Proteas are off to the Caribbean on Monday and, having gathered on Friday, new captain Dean Elgar has spent the weekend almost trying to market his new leadership style to an expanded squad of 19 players.

Elgar is one of the characters of the changeroom, and is often considered a joker, but he has shown he has strong leadership credentials at the Titans and certainly commands the respect of the players. But a new era begins next week, post the captaincy tenures of Faf du Plessis and Quinton de Kock, and Elgar has been making sure everyone is on the same page as to the way things are going to be done now.

“We had a great chat on our first night together, when I mapped out how I see things going forward and we had a conversation around that. It was very constructive and those conversations will be ongoing over the next few weeks. I want to try and change the mindsets going forward, it’s a challenge with 18 different individuals who all have different opinions.

“So I’m trying to get buy-in, get the guys to trust the process. Hopefully some of what I’ve done in the past can rub off on the players, they need to know they can rely on me and follow me. We haven’t played much Test cricket lately, so it’s been difficult to get a process going that would make us competitive. I had a lot of quality conversations with Graeme Smith through the years and I would be letting the team down if I didn’t use that,” Elgar said at the weekend.

The 33-year-old Elgar said he would be leaning on other players who have been part of the Test squad for more than five years like Temba Bavuma, Quinton de Kock, Keshav Maharaj and Kagiso Rabada, because their experience will be vital for a rebuilding side.

“Those players are so valuable and there is a great demand for them around the world of cricket, you can’t replicate their knowledge. There’s not a lot of experience floating around at the moment, so their presence is massive for the environment. It was a totally different era when I started playing Test cricket under Graeme Smith, we had a lot more caps around then.

“But I would like to try and use my learnings from back then, use the knowledge I gained. That time moulded me and taught me a lot of good lessons, so I would like to bring that into this side. We need to get back to scoring big hundreds, bowlers taking five-fors and taking 20 wickets to win a Test. There used to be that rich culture of success and with extended squads now we have all the options we need,” Elgar said.

Siya Kolisi did okay in Cape Town, but judging by coach Sean Everitt’s report card since the Springbok captain moved to Durban, the Sharks are expecting him to have an explosive impact in the Rainbow Cup.

And, as fate would have it, the Sharks’ first game in the new competition is back in Cape Town against the Stormers and Kolisi was on Thursday named in the starting line-up in the No.6 jersey.

“Siya arrived here under a lot of pressure but he certainly stood up and has trained very hard. The training has been a step up from what he was used to, but he has had really good preparation now and there has been a vast improvement in his conditioning.

“As he showed in the preparation series, his contributions on the field are telling and he’s a lot more involved in our system than he was with Western Province. He brings a lot of experience and leadership too, and the guys look up to him and take a lot of confidence from him being on the field,” Everitt said on Thursday.

The Sharks ruined Western Province’s farewell to Newlands back in January when they beat them 19-9 in the Currie Cup semi-finals. They absorbed plenty of pressure from the much-vaunted WP pack on that day, demolishing their maul, and Everitt on Thursday backed his pack to nullify the Stormers up front again.

“Obviously the challenge is going to come at scrum and lineout time, but it’s the same scrums both teams had in Super Rugby and a turnover scrum won us that game. Ox Nche and Thomas du Toit are both in the Springbok fold and Fez Mbatha must be knocking on the door, so it’s going to be an interesting tussle with their front row.

“In the Currie Cup, Western Province were more set-piece orientated, but I think the Stormers will come with a mixture of styles on Saturday because they would have got a lot of confidence from the preparation series where they scored some great tries and their attack certainly came on leaps and bounds. That makes it more difficult for us, but if we nullify them up front then we should be okay,” Everitt said.

Sharks team – Aphelele Fassi, Sbu Nkosi, Lukhanyo Am (C), Jeremy Ward, Yaw Penxe, Curwin Bosch, Grant Williams, Sikhumbuzo Notshe, Henco Venter, Siya Kolisi, Reniel Hugo, Ruben van Heerden, Thomas du Toit, Fez Mbatha, Ox Nche. Replacements: Kerron van Vuuren, Ntuthuko Mchunu, Wiehahn Herbst, JJ van der Mescht, Phepsi Buthelezi, Sanele Nohamba, Manie Libbok, Werner Kok.

While Proteas captain Heinrich Klaasen said he did not really know what his team could have done differently to stop the incredible Babar Azam onslaught that led to a crushing nine-wicket defeat at the hands of Pakistan in the third T20 International at Centurion on Wednesday evening, the skipper is not just sitting back and accepting the hiding that was dished out.

“I’ll be going back tonight and doing a lot of homework to see how we can improve and make sure we draw the last game on Friday,” Klaasen said after Babar had slammed 122 off just 59 balls, allowing Pakistan to romp to their stiff target of 204 with two overs to spare. Perpetual nemesis Mohammad Rizwan scored 73 not out in an opening stand of 197.

“It was a very good pitch and watching that batting from behind the stumps was quite something to be honest. We tried a few things, but you don’t want to be trying too many different things on a good pitch like that. They made a lot of good, well-executed balls look bad with great placement. They batted brilliantly and we did not have enough answers.

“Babar is a special player and when he comes off, it’s very difficult to defend. You always feel maybe you could do something different, but what I don’t know. Maybe we’ll reflect on some execution. But I reckon we were 10 runs short, both openers made more than 50 but we were again guilty of not having a set batsman at the back end. And we were very poor in the field, that was especially bad,” Klaasen said after the chastening loss.

Even though South Africa’s bowling – not well supported by lacklustre fielding – looked utterly toothless, Klaasen did not seem that keen on any major changes for the final T20 on Friday at the same venue, which the Proteas have to win to level the series.

“We’re going to be up for it and we have to bounce back and nail our skills. I don’t feel like we need a big change in personnel, we need some consistency in fact. The question is how do you take wickets on a surface like this where there is no turn, the slower balls skid on and the ball travels miles on the Highveld?

“I reckon the way to take wickets is to defend, we need to build pressure by executing our balls. The bowlers need to work harder to do that. We tried to go to death bowing a lot earlier this evening but that didn’t come off. And we strive to be better in the field, we’ve been brilliant in training but I think the guys are trying too hard, they’re not calm enough,” Klaasen said.