Ken Borland

Sports Minister Nathi Mthethwa has already accepted that there is no way Cricket South Africa will be able to hold their AGM on December 5, but that does not mean the new interim board of directors he announced on Friday are there for a holiday.

Mthethwa tasked the interim board with completing their mandate within three months, although he did leave the door open for their term of office to be extended.

“The interim board need to hit the ground running and deal with the current governance and structural issues. They should aim to implement the Nicholson Commission recommendations, consider the Fundudzi Forensic Report and take the recommended action or whatever action they deem to be appropriate, review all board decisions made since 2019 and restore the integrity and reputation of CSA.

“They have three months to do this, but that may be extended based on their progress. We hope they will deliver because this group knows exactly what it has to do and the Members Council still has an obligation to ensure their work is moving well. But there is no way December 5 can remain as the date for their AGM, which could have been avoided if certain people had listened earlier,” Mthethwa said on Friday.

The new interim board of directors is chaired by Judge Zak Yacoob, a former justice of the Constitutional Court, and includes other ‘independent’ figures in Caroline Mampuru, the deputy head of the Special Investigative Unit, Stavros Nicolaou, a senior executive for a major pharmaceutical company, and Andile Dawn Mbatha, the chief financial officer of the Independent Electoral Commission.

But a trio of passionate cricket-lovers who have gone to town in recent times in their criticism of the organisation and the recently-resigned board have also found accommodation on the interim board.

The most astonishing appointment is that of Haroon Lorgat, who has been at the forefront of CSA’s critics and was the federation’s chief executive as recently as September 2017, before being deposed by the power bloc that included Thabang Moroe, whose tenure and subsequent suspension and firing have been central to CSA’s governance crisis. But Lorgat is an internationally-respected administrator who is a former CEO of the International Cricket Council and CSA was a stable organisation during his watch.

Omphile Ramela, the president of the South African Cricketers Association, has also been a strident critic of CSA on behalf of the players, while Judith February is a lawyer and governance expert for the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the Institute for Security Studies, as well as a respected columnist who has also expressed her dismay over the administration of a sport she is clearly passionate about.

Andre Odendaal, the former CEO of the Western Province Cricket Association and the Cape Cobras, is another appointee, who has had a long history in the game as a first-class player, administrator and historian.

There is also a member of the old guard on the interim board in Xolani Vonya, the recently-resigned Easterns president who has been a strong supporter of both Moroe and company secretary Welsh Gwaza, who has been seen as a stumbling block to change at the organisation.

Vonya has been a controversial figure because the Easterns union have been wanting to get rid of him for many months, including holding a vote of no confidence against him, but Moroe and Gwaza gave him legal support to fight his removal.

Schalk Burger was usually at the vanguard when it came to setting a high intensity for the Springboks, but the legendary loose forward does not see that same intensity yet in the current crop of players as they return from Lockdown, which is why he does not believe the national team are ready to compete in the Rugby Championship.

The South African-based players have only had a maximum of three games each – the SuperFan Saturday warm-up, the dour Springbok Showdown and just the opening round of Super Rugby Unlocked. But a decision is due to be made on Friday as to whether they travel to Australia for the Rugby Championship, which is due to start on November 7, with the Springboks taking on Argentina in Brisbane.

“At the moment the Boks are not ready. I just haven’t seen the intensity to match the intensity we saw in the All Blacks/Australia game on the weekend. For us to perform away from home, I think the guys are a few games short. Rassie Erasmus said he wanted them to have six games before playing Test rugby, but if it is true that the November 7 match has already been postponed then they will have more time.

“But we have magnificent players and we play differently to the All Blacks and Wallabies, especially in the way we defend. It was so easy for Australia to get width with just one or two passes, but we rush up and make that so difficult. And we pride ourselves on our scrums and lineouts, so we would have put Australia under so much more pressure,” Burger said in a Laureus Sport For Good Foundation webinar on Wednesday night.

Burger also added that he was concerned about the injury suffered on a French field by Handre Pollard and the lack of certainty over who will back up Elton Jantjies at flyhalf, as well as the injuries at lock.

“Lock and flyhalf are real concerns. Lood de Jager, Handre Pollard and RG Snyman have all suffered major injuries and they are nine-to-10-month injuries, so one wonders if they will be ready for the British Lions tour next year, which is a red-letter event for South Africa. I’m waiting for a few young locks to really stand up, there’s massive scope for that now.

“At flyhalf, Elton is the most natural choice to take over from Handre, but we need someone else too. The question is whether that is Damian Willemse or Curwin Bosch. Kicking for poles will be very important and that’s probably Damian’s most inconsistent area. Or do they use Frans Steyn as cover for flyhalf? That’s all got to unfold over the next year and there are still lots of questions to be answered,” Burger said.

“But the biggest worry is that the guys have not played much rugby. Their intensity is not sharp enough and it looks like they are having difficulty handling the fact that there are no crowds and they need to adapt to that.”

With 13 players missing from the 23-man squad that beat the Stormers in their last SuperRugby game back in mid-March, Sharks coach Sean Everitt will be anxious that his team’s level of performance does not plummet into the depths of a virtual Kloof Gorge when they travel to Pretoria to take on the Bulls on SuperFan Saturday.

Everitt named his 30-man squad for the trip on Thursday and he will be leaning heavily on established combinations like Ox Nche and Thomas du Toit in the front row, locks Ruben van Heerden and Hyron Andrews, halfbacks Sanele Nohamba and Curwin Bosch, and Jeremy Ward and Lukhanyo Am in midfield.

“Saturday’s match is all about preparation, because we’ve been out for six months we need to reinstall and revise our game-plan. We need to make sure everyone understands it and we’re taking a few youngsters up with us to see where they are too in terms of fitting into our system. I’ll be looking at our tempo, accuracy and conditioning because we don’t know where we are right now with those.

“The players we have brought in suit the way we want to play. A guy like Manie Libbok is multiskilled, really versatile and has dangerous x-factor. He offers something in the same mould as Bosch and Aphelele Fassi when we play him at fullback. Werner Kok is also a workhorse and his work-rate epitomises the energy and enthusiasm we want to play with. He’ll start on the wing and then we’ll play him a bit at centre in the second half,” Everitt said on Thursday.

After such a promising season was washed down the basin by Covid-19, the Sharks are in a rebuilding phase and several new faces have the chance to establish themselves in the senior team. Saturday’s match at Loftus Versfeld is an important step in testing the depth of the squad.

“We were happy where we were, but we had been very fortunate from an injury point of view and were reaping the benefits of a long pre-season in which we did a lot of work on the changes to our game. We were on a roll, but dwelling in the past is not something I do, we are looking forward. It was sad for guys like Louis Schreuder, Tyler Paul and Andre Esterhuizen, who were in their last season with the Sharks.

“But it’s all a clean slate now, it’s a whole different competition because the Bulls have done some really good recruiting and the Lions too. We’re going back to the drawing board to see how we can improve. We’ve had some bad luck with injuries and we are missing some quality players like Fassi, Tambwe and Nkosi, but we started preparing a while ago with two squads,” Everitt said.

Players not considered for this weekend’s squad due to injury were fullback Fassi, loose forwards Henco and James Venter, hooker Kerron van Vuuren and wings Madosh Tambwe and Sbu Nkosi.

Squad: Ox Nche, Mzamo Majola, Dylan Richardson, Dan Jooste, Thomas du Toit, John-Hubert Meyer, Ruben van Heerden, JJ van der Mescht, Hyron Andrews, Emile van Heerden, Evan Roos, Adam Mountfort, Celimpilo Gumede, Tera Mtembu, Sikhumbuzo Notshe, Phepsi Buthelezi, Grant Williams, Sanele Nohamba, Jaden Hendrikse, Curwin Bosch, Jordan Chait, Muller du Plessis, Caleb Dingaan, Jeremy Ward, Marius Louw, Lukhanyo Am, JP Pietersen, Werner Kok, Manie Libbok, Thaakir Abrahams.

New Central Gauteng Lions president Anne Vilas does not see herself as being a new broom sweeping clean but what she will bring to her role is business acumen and a great passion for the game of cricket.

Vilas is certainly not a new face around the Wanderers – she has been on the Lions board for nine years, was the vice-president to predecessor Jack Madiseng and is highly-regarded as an administrator.

In fact, she says she is happy to build on the legacy Madiseng created during his tenure from September 2016.

“In revealing my goals I’m really cognisant of my board and these are goals that we share together. A lot of them are what Jack has done in his term, sticking to the pillars he created for the Central Gauteng Lions,” Vilas told Saturday Citizen.

“Transformation is always the number one priority for all of us at the Lions, particularly right now with what’s happening in the world. We need to revive and grow the game in the townships, that’s very important. We also want to grow women’s cricket, which is going to be tough because there are not enough facilities even for men’s clubs. But we want to ensure that the women at least get equal opportunity.

“The financial stability of the union and the clubs, who I would like to see not being so reliant on the CGL, is also very important, and we need to increase the amount of cricket being played at schools and at age-group level, it’s vitally important to play as much cricket as we can. The upkeep of the Wanderers is another pillar, getting the most out of it as a multi-purpose stadium,” Vilas said.

Growing up in a household with a sports-mad father and two brothers, and then having three sons of her own, there was not much chance Vilas was going to be cooking in the kitchen while there was so much sporting action going on around her. Her whole life has been spent in male-dominated pursuits which is why she is so comfortable being just the second female president of a cricket union after Zola Thamae in the Free State.

“I played garden cricket with my brothers and my dad, Herby Prout, was a keen sportsman at club level, as well as working in the sports industry. I had two brothers and then three sons, so there’s been a massive amount of cricket watched at the Wanderers over the years. I had seen great times watching my dad and brothers – the youngest, Robert, was the wicketkeeper for Mark Rushmere’s 1983 SA Schools side [which also included Dave Rundle, Daryll Cullinan, Dave Callaghan and Meyrick Pringle] – and I wanted my boys to play club sport as well and make those friendships.

“And I’ve worked in a male-dominated sports industry all my life, so it is not new to me. I don’t want to be in the position I am because of what I am, but because of who I am. But if being president is important to women in general, if I can make a difference to future women wanting to get involved in cricket, then that’s good,” Vilas said.

For Vilas, her journey in cricket started at club level and she believes it is time the game went back to its roots and made sure they were strong.

“Every male member of my family went to King Edward VII School and my boys played at Old Eds. I played hockey there and was a sponsor through our sports goods business, but then one of my friends at the club suggested I make myself available for the Lions board, they would put my name forward. That’s how I got into cricket administration.

“Those friendships I spoke about from the old days of club sport, we’ve lost those. Cricket used to be about family and kids coming to watch, but the sport is not really growing now, it’s static. It comes back to the lack of facilities, nobody is building any more cricket fields. So we have a limited amount of people playing and these days kids want instant success so if they don’t make the A or B team then they go and play something else. People are no longer playing just for the love of the game,” Vilas said.

The Covid-19 pandemic has, of course, been an arrant disaster for cricket but Vilas is well-placed both as a businesswoman and as the mother of Dane, the internationally-acclaimed former Proteas wicketkeeper/batsman who now plays for Lancashire, to come up with solutions.

“I’ve seen through Dane’s experiences in England how the counties make money and through my cricket contacts in England, Australia and New Zealand, I have my finger on what happens around the world. From a purely business point of view, Covid will have a massive effect. In our own industry, schools and clubs weren’t able to finish the last season so we’re going to be selling them less equipment for next season.

“The whole Lockdown will have a knock-on effect and sponsors will be badly affected as well,” Vilas, whose company imports and distributes such big brands as Gunn and Moore and Ping, said.