Ken Borland

Hot on the heels of the new Cricket South Africa board protesting that they inherited the mess that was the Social Justice and Nation-Building hearings, there is a second legacy of the old, disgraced board that may also cause them strife in the coming months.

I do have some sympathy for chairman Lawson Naidoo and his fellow directors when they ask with some frustration, in the wake of CSA’s embarrassing arbitration loss to Graeme Smith, “What were we supposed to do?”

The fact that SJN ombudsman Dumisa Ntsebeza chose only to make “tentative findings” on “untested evidence”, but was quite happy to make public claims of racism (surely the most damaging allegation against a White South African), meant CSA were almost damned if they do, damned if they don’t.

If they failed to further investigate the SJN allegations, then they would have been accused of ignoring the systemic racism that no doubt was part of our cricket in previous decades. But by acting on the claims against Smith, they left themselves open to criticisms of a witch-hunt and slander because the evidence was so flimsy.

Naidoo and fellow director Steven Budlender, the noted advocate, defended themselves in a Daily Maverick article this week, but what they did not mention was the way CSA’s legal representatives handled themselves in the arbitration, being criticised by the officials for “changing their tack” in the middle of the hearings and “trying to trap Smith”.

Little wonder costs were awarded against CSA.

Because the SJN was not properly set up to hear and test such inflammatory evidence in a better-controlled legal environment, the previous board certainly left Naidoo and Co with an explosive booby-trap.

The other decision of the previous board that is now causing some unhappiness in cricket circles is the automatic promotion/relegation that will apply at the end of next summer and see one of the top eight teams go down to the second division.

At the moment, one of Northern Cape, KZN Inland or South-Western Districts look set to be promoted. The Free State Knights, based in Bloemfontein, are bottom of the Division One relegation standings, with North-West (Potchefstroom) and the KZN Dolphins (Durban) tied second-from-bottom. Even teams like Western Province (Cape Town) and the Eastern Province Warriors (PE) have anxious times ahead as they are only lead the Knights by 10 points.

Do CSA really want one of those major centres to miss out as the likes of Kimberley, Pietermaritzburg or Oudtshoorn have a Division One team instead?

The problem with automatic promotion/relegation is that it is unlikely, barring a mass defection of players, that the team coming up will be better than the side going down, given the quality of cricket played in Division II.

There are many good reasons to ensure teams in the lower division can work their way up into the premier section, but the majority of fans do not want to see the Dolphins, Western Province or the Central Gauteng Lions playing in the second league. Imagine iconic stadiums like Newlands, the Wanderers or Kingsmead not hosting the best domestic players?

The only reason teams like KZN or the Lions, who would have been involved in the relegation battle before their surprise victory in the One-Day Cup right at the end of the season, would find themselves in danger of going down is because they provide most of the Proteas team.

There are many who feel automatic promotion/relegation is there to ensure the smaller unions, whose votes are often like the tail wagging the dog, share a place at the top table for at least one season before themselves being demoted.

I know CSA have a lot on their plate, but tweaking this system to ensure the Division II winners are only promoted if they beat the bottom side in Division I, is hopefully going to become a priority.

Coming after their impressive ODI series win over South Africa, the opening day of the Test series was a tough one for Bangladesh as they probably made the wrong decision at the toss by sending the Proteas in to bat and then bowled poorly in the morning session to compound the mistake.

Openers Dean Elgar (67) and Sarel Erwee (41) added 113 for the first wicket, before Bangladesh fought back in the afternoon to reduce the hosts to 180/4. But Temba Bavuma (53*) and Kyle Verreynne (27*) then made sure it was South Africa’s day at Kingsmead as they added an unbeaten 53 to take the Proteas to 233/4 at stumps.

Bangladesh coach Russell Domingo admitted a lack of confidence in batting first and an inexperienced attack was the cause of their woes. Pacemen Taskin Ahmed, Ebadot Hossain and Khaled Ahmed only have 25 Test caps between them.

“We’re still trying to improve our Test cricket and there is still a bit of uncertainty over our batting on pitches with pace and bounce, that was behind the decision to bowl first,” Domingo revealed on Thursday evening.

“We’re trying to address the confidence of the batsmen so they are able to front up when batting first on wickets that are tough. There was not too much in the decision and it would have been nice to actually start at 10am because the delay meant the clouds had burned off.

“A few of the batsmen are playing their first Test here and we’re trying to get them to have confidence in their ability, but there’s still a long way to go.

“We also have a very inexperienced attack and we bowled poorly in the first session. Obviously the guys were a bit nervous or over-eager, on a pitch they thought would assist them. But we were much better after lunch,” Domingo said.

The Bangladesh attack did clearly miss left-arm quick Shoriful Islam, one of the stars of the ODI series.

“Shoriful is injured, he has an ankle niggle which is why he missed selection, and is back is troubling him too,” Domingo revealed. “With only four bowlers, we could not risk one who was 50/50.

“The pitch has not done as much as we thought it would, but Khaled ran in hard, he bowled one ball at 150km/h and his attitude was fantastic. He showed good pace and control.

“We kept it nice and tight in the last session and the new ball is just four overs away. Obviously it will be fantastic if we can get one or two early wickets with it.

“If we can keep the Proteas to around 320 then we’re very much in the contest,” Domingo, a former South Africa coach, said.

Many teams coming to Loftus Versfeld these days try to ignore the effects of altitude, but one factor the Bulls are hoping Munster are not able to brush aside in their United Rugby Championship clash in Pretoria on Saturday is the late afternoon heat of a summer’s day.

Kick-off on Saturday is at 4.05pm and, judging by the weather forecast for Pretoria this week, the temperature could still be a warm 28°, a far cry from the 7° Munster was shivering in on Monday.

“We hope the conditions at home will give us a bit of an advantage,” Bulls flyhalf Chris Smith said on Monday. “The coastal teams battle with altitude here and hopefully the sun is out on Saturday.

“Hopefully it’s cooking for the 4pm kickoff and that heat could actually be more important for us than the altitude. We hope we can chase them around the field with the sun beaming down.

“We want to make them tired and then hopefully the game will open up a bit later on. But it’s going to be a good challenge for us, to measure ourselves against top players in the URC,” Smith said.

It’s a big sporting week for the Smith family, with Chris’s teenage brother Daniel scoring his maiden first-class century for the Western Province cricket team. The 27-year-old Chris Smith is a key figure in the Bulls side at present, with Morne Steyn suspended and Johan Goosen out injured, and he has enjoyed very good outings against both Zebre in Parma and Griquas in Kimberley.

“I’ve definitely felt the pressure because I’ve mostly played off the bench for the last two years, I have not played many full 80s,” Smith said. “But I see it more as an opportunity.

“It’s more the pressure I’m putting on myself to make use of this opportunity than any external pressure.

“I’ve been working on playing more flat and being more in the defence’s faces. I do tend to hang back a bit, I sometimes rely more on my passing game than my running game,” Smith said.

In what could unfortunately become the norm in coming years, 60% of South Africa’s cricket matches in 2021 were T20 internationals, but the Proteas did show an encouraging run of form in the format, culminating in an unfortunate early departure from the World Cup in the United Arab Emirates.

South Africa played 23 T20s in 2021 and won 15 of them, making them one of the most successful teams globally over the last year in that format. Considering that they began the year by losing home and away T20 series against Pakistan 2-1 and 3-1, it meant they won 13 of their last 16 matches, an impressive achievement.

The turnaround happened when the Proteas went to the West Indies and beat the defending T20 World Cup champions in that series. With a more settled squad and confidence growing, Ireland could not handle them and were swept aside 3-0, and nor could Sri Lanka, who were also whitewashed on their home turf.

South Africa went into the T20 World Cup in form and they were unlucky to not qualify for the semi-finals having lost just one game in the group stage. That was to Australia in their opening match when a below-par batting performance on an unhelpful pitch for strokeplay left the valiant Proteas attack with just a little too much to do.

Despite South Africa then upsetting the previously unbeaten England team, Australia’s nett run-rate was just a little better than their’s and the eventual champions snuck through.

Wrist-spinner Tabraiz Shamsi was the main man behind South Africa’s T20 success and he took 36 wickets in 22 matches in 2021 at an average of just 13.36 and an economy rate of 5.72; amazing figures that saw him ranked the No.1 T20 bowler in the world for much of the year.

Aiden Markram was a revelation in the shortest format and was the leading run-scorer for the Proteas in T20s in 2021 with 570 at 43.84 and a strike-rate of 148.82. Second to him was Quinton de Kock (524 at 43.66, SR 131.32), a man who hogged the headlines for much of the year.

De Kock was man of the series, with brilliant innings of 141 not out and 96, as South Africa won both Tests in the West Indies, which was the turning point of their year. He also made an ODI century in Ireland.

But it was a day on which he did not take the field which created the most stir. CSA’s board rashly decided to issue a directive that all players must take a knee in support of Black Lives Matter on the morning of their crucial T20 World Cup game against the West Indies. It is an issue that the Proteas had discussed at length without coming to a united way of showing support, but the board made a sudden and unilateral decision without consultation. De Kock opted not to play rather than make the prescribed gesture.

Fortunately all parties then talked it out and, going forward, the national team will all take the knee.

Other players to make strong statements on the field during 2021 were fast bowler Anrich Nortje, potent in the Test matches and one of the best bowlers at the T20 World Cup; Markram across formats and with encouraging gains in his back-up off-spin; Rassie van der Dussen, who finally made his maiden Proteas century with his 123* in an ODI versus Pakistan; Keshav Maharaj, who also led impressively in white-ball cricket when Temba Bavuma was injured; and David Miller, who played some matchwinning innings in limited-overs cricket.