Ken Borland

Springbok captain Siya Kolisi has no reason to massage the egos of the Argentina forwards so when he said on Friday that their pack was similar to the one he leads it was perhaps the ultimate compliment. And an indicator of how stiff a challenge the South African team face in their opening Rugby Championship match at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium on Saturday.

Argentina coach Mario Ledesma has said this week that taking on the Springbok pack is the toughest challenge his forwards will face, and Kolisi returned the compliment by saying the Pumas pack was similar. Pablo Matera and Facunda Isa are world-class loose forwards, locks Guido Petti and Marcos Kremer can mix it with the best and Julian Montoya and Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro provide plenty of fire in the front row.

“It’s a big challenge for us too against the Argentina forwards, they are a very strong pack who pride themselves on mauling and scrumming, and at the breakdown they all get involved. They are similar to us and that’s what makes it so difficult. So there is definitely mutual respect between the two packs. They are a completely different challenge to the Lions.

“So we have done no less preparation for them. We have to make sure we can get our own game going, if we get it right then it doesn’t matter who we are playing against. Obviously Argentina will want to prove a point. We know the challenge they’ll pose – a strong pack with their ball-carries and guys really getting into the breakdown,” Kolisi said on Friday.

Several new faces have been brought in to refresh the team after their huge exertions in the British and Irish Lions series and Kolisi said they have an important role to play in keeping the Springboks in the number one spot in the world rankings in what will be an incredibly tough Rugby Championship.

“The guys getting an opportunity to play and Joseph Dweba playing his first Test are very hungry and they really want to play, so they are going to bring energy. We want Joseph, who I know is very excited, Ox Nche and Wilco Louw to take charge in the scrum battle. And myself and Kwagga Smith have played together quite a bit and we work well together.

“The goal after winning the World Cup was to maintain our number one ranking and consistently stay there. We don’t want to be once-off winners. We want to win more games and trophies, that’s how we will keep being number one. The coaches give us simple messages to play simple rugby, they want us to focus on the stuff that does not require talent and I love it,’ Kolisi said.

Johnny Grave is the CEO of Cricket West Indies so it is perhaps fitting that Cricket South Africa will on Thursday confirm that their tour to the Caribbean starting next month has been resurrected. And now that the threats to suspend the Proteas from international cricket have died down, a full tour by India at the end of the year is also likely to be announced soon.

South Africa were originally scheduled to tour the West Indies in July and August last year, but that trip was flushed down the toilet by the Covid-19 pandemic. Now the Proteas are set to return to the Caribbean for the first time since 2010 and will play two Tests and five T20s, all on the tropical island of Trinidad.

CSA Director of Cricket Graeme Smith is holding a media “engagement” on Thursday in which he will provide an update on upcoming international tours. The fixtures for the Caribbean trip will surely be a part of that.

But what Smith probably won’t mention is how well talks have been going with India and specifically the BCCI president Saurav Ganguly. There is certainly a rapport between the two former international captains and releasing all the Proteas involved in the IPL from the last ODI and the T20 series against Pakistan now seems to have been an excellent decision because India look set to undertake a full tour of South Africa next summer.

Starting in December, India will play Tests, ODIs and T20s against the Proteas, which will not only provide a welcome boost to CSA’s finances but also provide massive entertainment.

South Africa are also scheduled to tour India for a T20 series in September as part of the T20 World Cup preparations, but there has been speculation that the currently suspended IPL could be moved into that window. Whether that happens or not will be an excellent test of how strong the relationship between Smith and Ganguly is.

The Proteas’ other confirmed fixtures are three ODIs and three T20s in Ireland in July as part of the World Cup Super League.

While Australia’s panicking cricketers at the Indian Premier League are perhaps paying their penance for refusing to tour South Africa earlier this year, Cricket South Africa and their players in the league have adopted a more measured approach with it being left up to the individual whether they want to come home or not.

India are facing a massive outbreak of Covid-19, with the largest number of daily infections recorded anywhere in the world since the start of the pandemic, and on Monday it was confirmed that the virus has breached the IPL’s biobubble. Monday’s match between the Kolkata Knight Riders and the Bangalore Royal Challengers was postponed due to two Kolkata players testing positive.

There have also been unconfirmed reports of positive tests in the Chennai Super Kings camp and amongst the groundstaff at Delhi’s Arun Jaitley Stadium, one of six venues the T20 competition is using.

A handful of Australian cricketers have already pulled out of the IPL, but with their government now instituting a travel ban, threatening a five-year prison sentence for anyone entering the country who has been to India recently, their remaining players have been agitating for a chartered flight to be organised to fly them home.

There has also been speculation that the England and Wales Cricket Board will order their players in India to come home.

But CSA will neither organise a chartered flight nor tell the South African players what to do, chief medical officer Dr Shuaib Manjra told The Citizen on Monday.

“We communicated with the players last week and told them that CSA will support them whichever way they want to handle this, the decision is their’s whether to stay and play, or whether to come home. This event is outside of their CSA contracts, which is why it’s up to them. We will offer them advice, but we are not going to spend millions on a chartered flight,” Manjra said.

While South Africans might be saying ‘ooh la la’ at seeing karma in action for the Australian and English cricketers, the health and safety of the 10 South Africans at the IPL is obviously of prime importance.

Five of those players – Kagiso Rabada, Quinton de Kock, David Miller, Lungi Ngidi and Anrich Nortje – have CSA national contracts.

With the coronavirus ripping through India at a rate of more than 3000 deaths a day, the pandemic now hitting the IPL amidships could cost the BCCI hundreds of millions of dollars if the tournament has to be called off. India’s hosting of the T20 World Cup at the end of October must also now be in doubt.

Eastern Cape Cricket on Thursday called on Cricket South Africa (CSA) to do “something tangible to put an end to racism at all levels of the sport”, perhaps unaware that the national body had already released a statement the previous night placing on record all the initiatives they have already implemented to ensure transformation of the cricket system.

CSA also reaffirmed their support for the Black Lives Matter movement and said it welcomed both Lungi Ngidi’s initial statement in this regard and the letter of support made by 36 Black coaches and former players.

CSA said they have spent nearly R385 million on cricket transformation and development in the 2019/20 financial year alone and will continue to invest resources in those programs. They pointed out that 10 of the 12-person CSA Board, including president Chris Nenzani and vice-president Beresford Williams, are Black, six of them being Black African. CSA has 64 full-time employees, 52 of which are Black.

In terms of coaching, 92% of nationally accredited coaches in South Africa are Black and 67% of national umpires and match referees.

According to the CSA statement, they support 612 township-based cricket clubs, 1052 township primary school cricket clubs and 572 township high school cricket clubs. They added, however, that the facilities in these areas remain a huge area of concern for the organisation.

Meanwhile, Rassie van der Dussen showed why he is not just a superb batsman but also a top-class human being as he became the first White current Protea to publicly back the Black Lives Matter movement.

“I support BLM, I’m against all murders, physical, character and cultural murder. I support equal opportunities for all. Because I support BLM it does not mean that I support violence or Marxism, therefore I refuse to be labelled by people,” Van der Dussen said in a tweet.

“The Boards of Eastern Province Cricket and the Eastern Cape Cricket Warriors franchise call on Cricket South Africa to take to heart the racism issues raised by former national players and coaches – many of whom are from the Eastern Cape. It is not enough to merely condemn incidents of racism and to publicly support the Black Lives Matter movement. Something tangible must be done to put an end to racism at all levels of the sport – and particularly at professional level where the example needs to be set,” the Eastern Cape Cricket statement said.

Andrew Breetzke, the CEO of the South African Cricketers’ Association, told Sport24 on Thursday that a re-evaluation of both their and CSA’s role in systemic racism needs to take place.

“SACA has life skills programmes that deal directly with diversity in teams and we need to revisit that. We have systems in place that have dealt with issues where players feel they have been unfairly treated in the past, and that still stands, but we need to look at them again. We are, and have always been, there to take up issues for players. In any given season, there are a number of issues that are raised. The system does work. 

“What has come to the fore in the last two weeks, though, is the unconscious biases that exist and that requires some work from everybody. We’re pleased that players are speaking up about things that have impacted their careers in the past. We have to welcome that. We have to have those discussions. That’s how we look at this and it’s incumbent on all stakeholders to look within,” Breetzke said.

A statement from the Proteas team regarding the Black Lives Matter movement was expected on Thursday but had still not been made at the time of going to press.