Ken Borland

While a majority independent board and an independent chair have been the most well-publicised aspects of the new Cricket South Africa constitution eventually agreed to by the Members Council, the process by which independent directors are appointed is another vital pillar of the new MoI … and it is now raising concerns among stakeholders in the game.

The MoI puts into place a Nominations Committee which will be a six-person panel comprising either a men’s or women’s former international player nominated by SACA, alongside a former CSA president nominated by the Interim Board, a Members Council representative and people from the Institute of Chartered Accountants, Institute of Directors and the Legal Practice Council.

The only problem with the Nominations Committee is that their word is final and the non-independent directors, or anyone else, are not allowed to object to the names they come up with.

The dangers of that clause are brought into focus by the first board that will serve under the new MoI. Because the Nominations Committee will only exist after the new constitution is formally adopted on Wednesday, they will be picking from a list that the Interim Board have seemingly put together from the applicants who put themselves forward before the cut-off date for applications, which was in February.

It is hardly an independent process because nobody knows who applies and who handled the applications, apart from the Interim Board.

Given the schisms in South African cricket that are obviously still present even though they will ‘officially’ be signed away on Wednesday, there is still an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty out there, and that has led to all manner of speculation and rumour about who CSA’s new directors will be.

The return of Norman Arendse, president of CSA from 2007 to 2008 and a controversial figure because of his continued interference in the selection of the national team, has been mooted, while some administrators have warned of a new wave of cadre deployment as they fear Minister of Sport Nathi Mthethwa wants to drive the ANC agenda in cricket.

Other administrators have called for the institution of an independent administrative office to handle applications for independent director posts, which would then pass them on to the Nominations Committee, with independent auditors exercising oversight through the whole process.

The process of appointing independent directors has the potential to be the new battleground of South African cricket.

Pink Day, the charity event raising funds for cancer research, has been hosted by the fast-paced city of Johannesburg at the Wanderers for the last 9 years and Sunday’s second ODI between South Africa and Pakistan may not have any spectators allowed, but the Proteas need to bring their usual intensity and action-packed approach in order to stay alive in the series.

The first ODI was lost on the back of a second-wicket partnership of 177 between Babar Azam and Imam-ul-Haq; Pakistan scraped to victory off the last ball of the match because the Proteas then fought back and claimed six wickets for 85 runs. They did that using aggressive fast bowling led by Anrich Nortje.

The Wanderers is traditionally a haven for pace and bounce and Autumn on the Highveld adds more moisture and swing into the equation as well. South Africa’s pacemen need to be smarter about exploiting the conditions more, they perhaps relied too heavily on slower balls and cutters at Centurion when an approach more in line with how they would bowl in a Test match was called for.

“The plan was to bowl more Test lengths and we started brilliantly, but as the pitch became harder and flatter it was really difficult to defend and the batsmen were able to score quite freely. But a lot of credit should go to the bowlers, I’ve been in a lot of situations like this on the Highveld and the team chasing gets home with five or six overs to spare,” centurion Rassie van der Dussen said after the first ODI on Friday night.

It was a valuable toss for Pakistan to win in the first game and it was tough going for the Proteas batsmen in the first hour. But some of the strokes offered were not well-executed as South Africa slumped to 55 for four before Van der Dussen came to their rescue.

The star batsman said the shot-selection could be excused, it was just the execution that let the batsmen down, and a similarly positive approach is likely to be brought to the Wanderers.

“Quinton de Kock and Aiden Markram gave us a good start and thought that they could then take on the powerplay. In hindsight they couldn’t because the pitch was a bit more difficult to bat on than they thought. You have to assess conditions and sometimes you make mistakes. But a guy like Quinny has played like that his whole career and we’re not too worried about the batting.

“England have probably been the best ODI team over the last two years and that formula works for them, so we want to give the batsmen the freedom to express themselves, especially up front in the powerplay. Quinny is usually brilliant there but it’s the nature of cricket that you won’t have success every time. Losing three wickets in a cluster is what we don’t want to do though,” Van der Dussen said.