Ken Borland

Long-serving Proteas manager and doctor Mohammed Moosajee remembers being made to bat in fading light at Transvaal nets in the early days of unity and he says such biases still exist in South African cricket, calling for a sporting version of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to help the healing process.

Moosajee was a fine cricketer who captained the South African Cricket Board version of the SA Schools side and was 23 years old when Unity happened. And yet he never added to his seven first-class caps when the new dispensation arrived.

“In 1992 when Unity happened, I was in the prime of my career and part of Transvaal training. But us guys from the SACB clubs only got to bat once the light was going down and there’s no doubt we had to work much harder because there was inherent bias. I felt we maybe came back into international cricket too easily, we sacrificed too much to appease the politicians.

“We must understand that prejudice is still very much part and parcel of our country, some still remains and we can’t just wish it away. There is no trust nor healing in cricket and we desperately need our own TRC because cricket is just a microcosm and reflection of a racist society. And our coaches also need to be given a platform because they are the ones who need to foster Black excellence,” Moosajee said at a recent Ahmed Kathrada Foundation webinar on racism in cricket.

Moosajee, who is now serving on the South African Cricketers’ Association management board, was adamant, however, that the Cricket South Africa Board should not be allowed to get their grubby little mitts on the TRC process.

“I am encouraged by the Cricket for Social Justice programme but we mustn’t forget it was set up by the same CSA who have had a litany of governance issues, if you are having continuous problems in the boardroom then it will impact on the delivery of transformation. So what credibility do CSA have? I will support it if it is run independently and not by CSA, if there is to be any credibility then the current Board cannot be involved.

“The most important stakeholders in coming up with solutions are the players and CSA must ask themselves why a few months ago they were in court fighting against their own players? There are people on that Board lining their pockets with directors’ fees and not taking into account proper corporate governance. Who will police the police? The Board cannot judge themselves,” Moosajee said.

The longest-serving member of the Proteas staff (from 2003 to the end of last year’s World Cup) said South African cricket has nevertheless come a far way from those early days of unity.

“In 2003 when I was appointed team doctor some of the squad members were uncomfortable not having a White doctor, but it did not bother me at all because they had no choice but to develop that trust. And in my early days as manager – it happened overseas as well, specifically in England and Australia – officials would try and bypass me and go directly to the coach.

“But after our first culture camp in 2010 we developed an authentic, emotional identity because we considered our fractured past, our history and our diversity. We wanted to use the fact we were the most diverse team in the world as an advantage and it was no surprise in 2012 when we became the first team to be ranked number one across all formats,” Moosajee explained.

Part of that process has been educating people that some of their simplistic views needed to evolve from bigotry to tolerance.

“When we would go to India and people were called “Chillipips”, they needed to be educated; when we went to Bangladesh and the call-to-prayer happened and guys would ask why they are screaming, they needed to be educated, and that’s what we tried to do from 2010 onwards. Culture is probably the most misunderstood part of any organisation but it can be the deciding factor in success or failure.

“But we also need to be honest. With a number of coaches and selectors, the challenge is an unconscious bias, but CSA also needed to stand up and take responsibility for things like the 2015 World Cup and four players of colour, because they left a lot to interpretation. Players of colour continue to feel unsupported and we need to applaud someone like Lungi Ngidi, a champion young man who showed awareness and spoke out,” Moosajee said.

WorldRugby may have this week opened a window for the Rugby Championship to take place in New Zealand between November 7 and December 12, but the situation is still far from ideal for South African participation. But commercial imperatives dictate that the Springboks simply have to find a way to get over there and play, otherwise SA Rugby will suffer devastating financial losses.

It is the Sanzaar competitions that bring in the bulk of South African rugby’s revenues and with SuperRugby having been scrapped after just half-a-dozen rounds, it is the Rugby Championship that needs to save the broadcast deals through providing some live content.

As SA Rugby CEO Jurie Roux said recently, the Rugby Championship is a very expensive competition to run, but the broadcast revenues are significant enough that the commercial value compels Sanzaar to continue the event. The difference between revenues and expenses is the reason SA Rugby can use the Rugby Championship to cross-subsidise several other competitions.

One of those competitions is the Currie Cup, which used to be an event of industrial proportions in South African rugby, the envy of the world. Sadly SA Rugby has over the years allowed the jewel in their crown, their most valuable property after the Springboks, to fade into relative insignificance.

But the imminent demise of SuperRugby is likely to bring a resurgence in domestic competition and a Currie Cup style tournament this year is going to play a crucial role in the Springboks returning to action; hopefully that local action will continue to be a focus in 2021 and beyond.

Even though playing in Europe seems to be the big prize at the moment, and private equity investors in our franchises are already saying this is essential for them to get a return on their money, hopefully SA Rugby will still put energy and resources into having a strong purely local competition.

In the meantime, the top eight teams in South Africa are going to play a tournament later this year to at least get rugby back on the go locally. Apart from providing some content for SuperSport, who pour millions into the game, those eight teams are also going to play a vital role in getting the Springboks ready for action.

With New Zealand and Australia already back playing rugby for half-a-dozen weeks and South African players realistically only returning to action in mid-September, there have been understandable concerns expressed that the Springboks are going to be on a hiding to nothing if the Rugby Championship is played this year, being so far behind in terms of preparation. There have been angry mutters about their World Cup win being tarnished.

But the reality of the situation is that even if the Springboks are going to disappoint in terms of on-field results, they simply have to return to action and our television screens, it is a financial imperative. And they have played for financial reasons before, most recently when they lost to Wales in Washington in June 2018.

New Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber has said a squad of 45 players are going to have to travel to New Zealand and quarantine before entering their bio-bubble, and there have even been complaints from local coaches that that will decimate their provincial squads. As is often the case in South African rugby, the unions are going to need a reminder that they are there to serve the national cause, any local competition this year is mostly about getting the Springboks ready for action.

Sanzaar CEO Andy Marinos certainly knows the value of the Springbok brand and last weekend he was stressing the importance of them returning to international action before the end of the year. And as we saw at last year’s World Cup, in which they were certainly underdogs, the ability to rise above the obstacles in their path is a great property of the Springboks.

“By no means will the playing field be level, but the Springbok side have a deep, steely resolve, and I know Rassie Erasmus and Jacques Nienaber will optimise whatever time they have to be as competitive as possible,” Marinos said.

Nienaber says the players in the Springbok squad need at least six games beforehand in order to be able to play in the Rugby Championship. They are unlikely to get much more than six matches unless rugby somehow resumes later this month, but at least they will be going to New Zealand feeling fresh.

And there is a large gap between the Rugby Championship kicking off and the end of SuperRugby Aotearoa and SuperRugby Australia. The New Zealand competition ends on August 16, with no final, while the Australian final will be held on September 19. Whoever handles the double-edged sword of rust versus fatigue best will have a large advantage, and I wouldn’t write off the Springboks just yet.

Sanzaar CEO Andy Marinos said on Saturday that cross-border rugby between South Africa, New Zealand, Australia and Argentina needed to continue, but whether he was just talking about the Rugby Championship or also SuperRugby surviving in something similar to its current format seems to still be classified information.

New Zealand Rugby seem to have already taken the decision to pull out of SuperRugby, while South Africa seem to be looking more and more into throwing in their lot with European competition. Australia are desperately trying to stay joined with their Kiwi neighbours, while Argentina are probably just hanging on to whatever scraps they can get.

But Marinos disagreed with the current narrative that Sanzaar’s partners are all trying to jump ship when he spoke in an SA Rugby Legends webinar on Saturday.

“We are busy working through our 2021 plans, but the whole return-to-play is not easy to navigate, you have Product A and then 24 hours later you have to change to Product B. The challenge is cross-border rugby because of all the government and medical controls and access to flights. We have to be realistic: The individual unions are responsible for keeping rugby alive and sustainable in each of their markets and then they can look at the feasibility of cross-border competition.

“But we are working through this as a joint venture. A round-robin structure next year is not looking that optimistic because flying won’t be that easy yet. But there is a strong acknowledgement that cross-border rugby needs to be in place in the future. Playing against players from other countries only makes our nations stronger internationally, that’s what has allowed the Sanzaar nations to be the dominant force in world rugby,” Marinos said.

The former Stormers and Wales centre denied that there was anything wrong with SuperRugby as a product and said the attacking nature of the competition has played a major role in the success of the four Sanzaar nations at the World Cup.

“The impact on the bottom line has been significant but it’s not because of poor delivery or a lack of quality or interest in the product. I would unashamedly say we have some of the best players in the world and we’ve seen that at the World Cup. The strength we’ve got is that the toughness of the competition and the global expansion of SuperRugby means our players are used to adapting to different conditions and being on the road for long periods.

“The Northern Hemisphere players don’t have that benefit, they have one-hour flights and they’re away for a weekend. The conditions we play under, plus the fact we put more air on the ball – there’s a very attacking mindset and the teams are as positive as possible – has played a significant role in the World Cup results. And with New Zealand and Australia playing again, we have seen an upturn in people coming back to the game, and SuperRugby can start regenerating itself,” Marinos said.

Cricket South Africa’s midnight statement saying former CEO Thabang Moroe is still suspended has only heightened the terrible uncertainty around the game in this country, the chief executive of the players’ union said on Friday.

Moroe was suspended on December 6 pending a forensic investigation into his management practices but arrived at the CSA offices in Melrose Estate on Thursday morning, ostensibly seeking to ‘return to work’. His lawyer, Michael Bill, said his suspension had lapsed after six months.

But the CSA Board issued a statement more than 15 hours later saying the “letter of suspension issued to the Chief Executive Officer explicitly stated that he was suspended until the conclusion of the independent forensic investigation” and that there was no predetermined timeframe attached to his suspension. The Board added that the forensic investigators had indicated their report was “imminent” and “there will be more clarity and certainty provided before the end of June.”

The South African Cricketers’ Association issued a warning earlier this week that CSA’s failure to make progress on Moroe’s disciplinary hearing would seriously erode the small gains in confidence in the organisation that have been painstakingly acquired by acting CEO Faul and director of cricket Graeme Smith, and Andrew Breetzke, the players’ union CEO, said on Friday that CSA’s statement did not alleviate the level of suspicion aimed at the Board.

“We’ve taken note of their intention to complete the disciplinary process with haste and that the forensic report is imminent, but there’s no real comfort that it will all be resolved soon. Thabang Moroe has not even been charged yet and history shows their disciplinary hearings have taken six months to complete from the date the person was charged.

“Given the crisis cricket is facing, we need certainty and CSA are just not creating that at the leadership level. It’s critical that President Nenzani answer the important questions because never before have there been so many crises all at once, and major sponsors Willowton, Standard Bank and Momentum have all said they are very concerned over governance,” Breetzke told Saturday Citizen on Friday.

Breetzke said it was also vital that there was transparency over the forensic investigation’s terms of reference, to allay fears that they were only examining the tip of the iceberg in terms of CSA’s financials.

“It’s a real concern that we don’t understand the terms of reference of the investigation because a lot hangs on that. Nenzani said the whole process would take six months and there is clearly evidence because Moroe was suspended based on the reports of the Social and Ethics and Risk and Audit committees. You would have thought the CSA Board would have dealt with this as a matter of urgency and not in such dribs and drabs.

“This is a systemic issue that runs really deep in CSA, but they are the custodians of cricket, not the owners, so all lovers and stakeholders of the game have a right to know. In terms of the court papers SACA have previously filed, there are lots of incorrect figures and significant negligence regarding the second MSL, plus journalists’ accreditation being revoked, so CSA don’t really have to look much further than that,” Breetzke said.