Ken Borland

In the wake of Duanne Olivier becoming the latest South African cricketer to drop the Kolpak bombshell, it would be only human for Cricket South Africa chief executive Thabang Moroe to be feeling betrayed and to be considering his options when it comes to ensuring that his organisation and the staff involved with the national teams don’t have to go through that pain again, never mind the considerable resources expended – and now wasted – on grooming a player to make a successful entry into international cricket.

Olivier was probably the good news story of the summer, getting a prolonged run in the national team thanks to injuries to Lungi Ngidi and then Vernon Philander, and his immediate success prompted the Proteas brainstrust to take drastic steps to keep him in the side: World-class spinner Keshav Maharaj was sidelined and they even went into some games a batsman short, further weakening an already struggling batting line-up, just to ensure their new-found Enforcer could keep charging in and taking wickets.

The falling-over-backwards continued at board level as Olivier was offered a two-year contract, something highly unusual. The fact that everyone else only received a one-year contract when the new deals were announced on Friday shows just how obliging they were trying to be to the 26-year-old Free State fast bowler.

And then it turns out that all the time he was talking about his Proteas achievements being a dream come true and how proud he was, all the time he was negotiating with CSA for a two-year contract, he had already decided to sign a lucrative Kolpak deal with Yorkshire.

South African cricket has been through this betrayal before of course, with Kyle Abbott and Rilee Rossouw jumping ship midway through the previous home series against Sri Lanka in January 2017. Abbott had spent the previous weeks gushing about how delighted he was to be finally getting a prolonged run for the Proteas while Rossouw, after CSA had spent huge amounts of medical bills on him and persisted with through one of the worst duck-laden starts to an international career, merely dumped his employees with barely a word spoken.

This is not a Kolpak move like Morne Morkel’s, who, after more than 10 years of service to South African cricket, decided his body could no longer take the grind of the international game and nobody bemoaned him giving his pension a well-earned boost in England.

Olivier is in his prime, has played just 10 Tests and two ODIs, and Ottis Gibson and Faf du Plessis have very much been making plans for the future around having him in the fast bowling pool.

Olivier is, of course, represented and managed by an agent, Weber van Wyk. Who just happens to be the same agent who organised the Kolpak deals for Abbott and Rossouw, hence the same scarcely ethical modus operandi that clearly cannot be termed ‘negotiating in good faith’. Van Wyk has earned a fortune exporting South African talent to England.

If you were the CEO of a multimillion rand company that spends millions on developing their key assets, only to see them up-and-leave as soon as they get promoted to a level that makes them attractive to others, what would you do? If the same person was behind three of your prize assets leaving, would you reconsider having any dealings with that agent or his clientele ever again?

When Olivier was called up to replace Abbott for the third Test against Sri Lanka in 2017, he told CricInfo: “I want to play as long as possible for my country. When I am playing, I don’t think about stuff off the field. I haven’t considered a Kolpak deal.”

Who would have thought he would follow Abbott so closely and so quickly, swelling his pockets but surely to the detriment of his standing in the game.

Sadly, we have seen this lack of patriotism stretch to rugby circles in Bloemfontein as well. Apart from the despicable shenanigans of Johan Goosen in retiring from the game for a year just to get out of a recently-extended mega-millions contract in France, so he could sign an even bigger contract with a rival club, a school like Grey College is not even pretending to support South African rugby anymore, having signed an exclusive deal with Goosen’s Montpellier club to feed players into their – and therefore France’s – pipeline.

Money can buy many things, but it will never be able to buy respect.

The absence of a single fully-contracted Black African batsman in the Titans squad for next season could limit their options when it comes to fulfilling the quota of three in every starting line-up, but CEO Jacques Faul said they had decided to beef up their bowling.

Grant Mokoena, who averaged just 26 in eight Sunfoil Series games and scored 49 runs at a strike-rate of only 89 in his three T20 appearances, has joined the Knights, while Daniel Sincuba played one four-day game, scoring 32 and 0, and has been released.

Former SA U19 Junior World Cup captain Tony de Zorzi showed glimpses of promise in a few opportunities he was given towards the end of the season, and he has been given a rookie contract, and the inside lane in terms of Black African batsmen.

Mokoena and Sincuba’s contracts have gone to a pair of fast bowlers who excelled for Northerns in their triumphant season – Eldred Hawken and Alfred Mothoa, while former SA U19 batsman Andrea Agathangelou, who has played county cricket for Lancashire and Leicestershire, has been signed from South-Western Districts.

“It’s probably not ideal, but we still have a lot of batting depth and we have decided to run with Tony de Zorzi, simply because whoever we bring in needs to be on the same sort of level as a Henry Davids or Aiden Markram, and there’s probably nobody close to that.

“We’ve beefed up the bowling and we have three quality pacemen in Lungi Ngidi, Malusi Siboto and Junior Dala, plus Alfred Mothoa is a banker and we’re excited about left-arm spinner Gregory Mahlokwana, who got injured after his first game, but we think he will play more,” Faul told The Citizen on Friday.

Nevertheless, readers of the Titans squad list will be struck by the tremendous depth at their disposal – eight current nationally-contracted players, four former Proteas and three players with bright international futures in Heinrich Klaasen, Markram and Ngidi.

Players like fast bowler Dala and leg-spinner Shaun von Berg are also certainly on the national selectors’ radar having been chosen for SA A and the CSA spin camp in India respectively.

Titans Contracted Players 2017/18: Andrea Agathangelou, Junior Dala, Henry Davids, Heinrich Klaasen, Heino Kuhn, Eldred Hawken, Aiden Markram, Albie Morkel, Alfred Mothoa, Lungi Ngidi, Rowan Richards, Malusi Siboto, Grant Thomson, David Wiese, Shaun von Berg, Jonathan Vandiar. Rookies – Tony de Zorzi, Rivaldo Moonsamy. CSA-contracted national players – Farhaan Behardien, Quinton de Kock, AB de Villiers, Faf du Plessis, Dean Elgar, Morné Morkel, Chris Morris, Tabraiz Shamsi.

“We have so many different options that we have guys who can bowl anything, in any situation, on any pitch,” Chris Morris, the RamSlam T20 Challenge’s leading wicket-taker, said on Wednesday as he discussed the Titans’ bowling attack ahead of the final in Centurion on Saturday.

The Titans won an astonishing eight games in a row to comfortably top the log by 13 points and their bowlers have led the way with six in the top-20 of the averages, all-rounders David Wiese, Albie Morkel and Morris all being in the top four. Fast bowler Junior Dala and wrist-spinner Tabraiz Shamsi have also excelled, and the Titans have other options in Lungi Ngidi, off-spinner Henry Davids and slow left-armer Graeme van Buuren.

“It’s gone pretty well for us as a unit and it has made it a lot easier for me knowing that there are a lot of other bowlers who can step up. The new guys have done very well and there’s a lot of back-up. I’ve never been in a team before that has every base so well covered,” Morris, who has taken 18 wickets, said.

The former Highveld Lions star said the Titans will go into the final eager just to keep enjoying themselves.

“The way Albie has captained the side has been aggressive and solid and we’re always looking to take wickets. We’re looking at Albie and Farhaan Behardien to see how they handle themselves before the final, it’s finals week, it doesn’t happen often, especially at home. We must just enjoy it – my theory is that you see the best catches in garden cricket because the guys are just having fun. So it’s vital for us to enjoy the final and it’s much more difficult to play against a happy team,” Morris said.