Extensive grassroots development and a detailed transformation policy that goes beyond mere numbers are now a must

Firdose Moonda16-Dec-2021Cricket in South Africa is institutionally racist. Cricket South Africa is institutionally racist. South Africa is institutionally racist. Whichever way we arrange these words, they’re not telling us anything we didn’t already know.South Africa was the last bastion of legalised white supremacy in the world. Apartheid officially ended only 27 years ago. When this website began in 1993, the majority of the South African population – people of colour – could not vote. But they could and did play cricket. The national team was readmitted into the international game two years earlier, in 1991, with an all-white team even though there were established leagues among players of colour. A white national team was chosen, as it had always been, emphasising cricket’s legacy as a sport of empire, promoted by prime minister Cecil John Rhodes and played by the head of his department, William Milton, who was once Test captain.We only need to look at the treatment of people of colour in the United States to know the shadow of discrimination is long and can last hundreds of years. It’s unsurprising that South Africa and cricket in South Africa still battles these demons of discrimination. The Social Justice and Nation Building (SJN) hearings and report have laid bare some of these demons, which constitute some of the gravest issues in the game over the last 30 years.The report has found that CSA, as well as some of its biggest names and at times its selection policies, have often been prone to racial bias. At the heart of the findings is that the champion team of 2012, who lifted the Test mace at Lord’s, has been stained by an exclusionary team culture. That was a team led by current director of cricket (DOC) Graeme Smith, that had just seen the retirement of current head coach Mark Boucher and was headlined by arguably South Africa’s greatest batter, AB de Villiers. All three are central to specific instances where their conduct was thought to be prejudicial.

The SJN has revealed a nuance that establish no outright heroes or villains and no decisions that were simply right or wrong

At the same time, the report also makes judgements against them which might seem to lie outside its remit. Ombudsman Dumisa Ntsebeza found that the appointments of Smith and Boucher were procedurally flawed, in essence because they were headhunted. But CSA’s HR operations were never meant to be within the mandate of the hearings. Ntsebeza was led in that direction, however, because the pair hold positions of power in the game today. The decisions they make now impact players in the current set-up and could those in the future.Still, it’s worth remembering that Smith and Boucher were roped in at a time of great turmoil in South African cricket, two weeks before an incoming tour by England, with then CEO Thabang Moroe suspended and no one in the position of head coach. Moroe had courted Smith for the role of DOC for months, only for Smith to withdraw from the process. Then-CSA president Chris Nenzani approached him and eventually convinced Smith to sign on. Smith then hired Boucher, his friend, but also a franchise coach. Both Moroe and Nenzani are black. They were the men making decisions that saw white men appointed, and not just any white men but Smith and Boucher. All these men have made some good decisions and some bad decisions, as we all do.Related

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The SJN has revealed a nuance that establish no outright heroes or villains and no decisions that were simply right or wrong. Thami Tsolekile is perhaps the best example. His career was derailed when he was not given the opportunity to play for the Test team in 2012, despite being contracted as Boucher’s replacement, and only because de Villiers decided he wanted to keep wicket. de Villiers remained in the position until 2014, when Quinton de Kock arrived. Tsolekile was sidelined and would eventually be embroiled in the corruption scandal of 2015-16.That same summer, Khaya Zondo was denied a debut in an ODI series in India, in favour of Dean Elgar, who was not even part of the original squad. Testimony from former selector Hussein Manack claimed de Villiers pressured him into making the decision to play Elgar over Zondo, which de Villiers has never denied. But de Villiers maintained he was only considering “cricketing” reasons. The report found de Villiers’ conduct in that incident to be discriminatory, which he strongly objects to.What we can see from these examples is that selection is not straightforward. There is a good case for why Tsolekile should have been the Test keeper – he was averaging over 40 in first-class cricket at the time. There is also a good case for why de Villiers should have – he allowed South Africa to field seven specialist batters. There is more of an argument for why Zondo should have been included – he was in the squad as a reserve batter – and not Elgar, who was flown in earlier because he had more domestic cricket experience.What makes these cases significant is that they pit a black African player against a white player; the most discriminated against, and the most privileged. And so when a decision is made, it has to consider cricketing as well as transformation imperatives. Right answers are rare. On occasions such as the 2015 World Cup semi-final, when a half-fit Vernon Philander was picked ahead of Kyle Abbott, decisions can hurt everyone almost immediately. On others such as the exclusions of Tsolekile and Zondo’s the hurt only emerges over time. And none of that can be changed.Graeme Smith, Enoch Nkwe, Mark Boucher and Linda Zondi at the unveiling of South Africa’s then new coaching structure in December 2019•AFPSo where do we go from here?The debates around selection aired at the SJN should prompt a more detailed policy for national and provincial teams, which does more than just laying out transformation targets (currently domestic teams have to field at least six players of colour in every XI, of which at least three must be black African, and the national team must field at least six players of colour of which at least two must be black African) and also contains detail on how to meet them and how to resolve disputes when two players of similar potential are competing for a similar spot.An example of how difficult this can be could come as early as the upcoming Test series against India. South Africa have eight quicks in their 21-player squad, with Kagiso Rabada and Anrich Nortje set to be certain starters, Lungi Ngidi and Duanne Olivier to compete for the third seamer spot and the rest as back-up. So how should the selectors decide between Ngidi and Olivier?On precedent, Ngidi should play, because the spot was his the last time South Africa played Tests, in the West Indies, and he performed well. On form and fitness, Olivier should play, because he is the leading wicket-taker in the first-class competition while Ngidi hasn’t played red-ball cricket since June or any competitive matches in five months. Further clouding the issue is the fact that not that long ago, Olivier chose to end his career in South Africa by opting for a Kolpak deal. He’s only back because Britain’s exit from the European Union means his agreement with Yorkshire is no longer in place.Some may argue that from the perspective of variety, neither should play and that the left-armer Marco Jansen should be capped and unleashed on India as early as possible. Others will feel Glenton Stuurman’s consistency will serve South Africa better. The selectors will have to factor all of these things in when they make their decision. Not everyone will be happy with whatever decision they make.

The SJN has opened a door. Like the country, it has been flawed, but it has also been among the most necessary things that have taken place in cricket, in sport, in society and in South Africa.

The SJN highlighted that there are still remnants of the belief that transformation and excellence are considered mutually exclusive. This is a notion that was birthed in whiteness and allowed to flourish under the misguided idea that people of colour were less capable. It masked the injustices which denied them access to resources and facilities to compete on a level playing field. Ultimately, extensive grassroots development a should be a focus of cricket, big business and government, even if it may not easily change the entrenched mindsets of white privilege that the SJN highlighted. Money can be ploughed into townships but if people in positions of power don’t ensure players of colour are picked and backed the system will not change.Almost every player of colour has a story to tell about how they were treated poorly, overlooked, othered or excluded; from South Africa’s first, Omar Henry, who was denied opportunity at the 1992 World Cup, to one of South Africa’s best, Hashim Amla. More’s the pity that Amla, who is notoriously private but said on his resignation as Test captain that, “the first time you play Test cricket everybody doubts you because of the colour of your skin,” did not make a submission at the SJN. Neither did Makhaya Ntini, despite numerous interviews in which he detailed why he would run from the ground to the hotel rather than sit on a bus with team-mates who avoided him, or Philander. This trio are South Africa’s most successful players of colour and their stories would have added extra weight.Similarly, none of the former players facing the brunt of these allegations gave oral testimony before the ombudsman. Smith, Boucher and de Villiers submitted written affidavits as did a slew of others. What they did not do was take the opportunity to show their humanity by appearing before the ombudsman and thereby begin a two-way conversation which may ultimately lead to greater understanding. That may yet come when the dust settles.Though much of the SJN’s timing has been inopportune, with parts of it running through the T20 World Cup campaign, the report was released on the eve of South Africa’s Day of Reconciliation: December 16. This day was celebrated by the Afrikaner community in commemoration of their victory in the battle of Blood River in 1838, and by the African National Congress, as it marked the founding of their militant wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe, in 1961.Historically, this was a day of violence. But in 1995, December 16 was chosen to signify unity and racial healing. South Africa, and South African cricket, are very far from either but the SJN has opened a door. Like the country, it has been flawed, but it has also been among the most necessary things that have taken place in cricket, in sport, in society and in South Africa.

ECB banks on return of Andrew Strauss to bring clarity at the top after latest Ashes debacle

Andrew Miller03-Feb-2022″You can change me, change the head coach, change the captain. But we’re only setting up future leaders for failure. That’s all we’re doing. We’re only pushing it down the road.”In the raw aftermath of England’s Ashes surrender, it was somewhat jarring to hear Ashley Giles talking as though he was not, actually, a highly paid ECB executive with some agency in the shambles that had just unfolded, but rather a powerless victim of circumstance.And yet, here we are, five weeks later, and Giles’ employment status is now exactly as he had painted it. Those sentiments now sound less like the self-serving wrigglings of a man trying to pass the buck, and more a pre-emptive strike against his inevitable executioners, the same ECB board who are doubtless hoping that his departure – and, in all probability, Chris Silverwood’s and Graham Thorpe’s too – will be accepted by the wider public as a sufficiency of blood-letting.Related

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For Giles is right in one sense. His departure alone cannot atone for a decade of decision-making that has rendered England’s Test cricketers incompetent in the one series that they profess to value above all others. You only need to compare the clueless techniques on parade in the Ashes with the rip-roaring precocity of England’s white-ball starlets at the Under-19 World Cup to recognise that English cricket’s problems are self-inflicted pathway issues, rather than an inability to cultivate talent per se.The buck tends not to stop in British public life anymore, but if it did, then surely the man in the ejector seat would be Tom Harrison, the ECB’s Teflon-coated CEO, whose skills as a TV-rights negotiator have long since been subsumed by his ham-fisted stewardship of the sport’s most recent crises. Truly, it defies belief that such a slick boardroom operator can be made to look so out of his depth so often by such a mediocre generation of politicians as those currently represented on the DCMS select committee. And while that precise issue may be a digression from the matter at hand, it all feeds back to the same sense that the ECB has become unmoored from the most fundamental cricketing values on which the sport’s reputation lives and dies.Of all the faults that Giles may possess, he cannot be accused of lacking empathy for his sport. But in spite of the swirling mood music of English cricket, he is wrong in the broader sense, in the inference that his players had no means of influencing the contest that would define many of their careers. The defeatism in Giles’ Sydney sentiments chimed with a fatalistic tenure as England’s director of cricket, one that will come to be remembered as much for his responses to the Covid outbreak as for the grim ending in Australia, but one which was ultimately too enabling of the mediocrity that engulfed it.In the aftermath of the World Cup win in 2019, two key decisions contributed to an undeniable sense of drift for what would turn out to be the sharp end of Giles’ tenure. And damningly, both decisions stemmed from the same desire to give his players what they wanted in times of duress, as opposed to what they needed to keep pace with the sport’s highest standards.First, there was Giles’ pre-pandemic decision to promote the popular but unchallenging Silverwood to the role of head coach across all three formats. It was a legacy, no doubt, of Giles’ own uncomfortable period as England’s specialist white-ball coach between 2012-14, when his squad’s requirements invariably came second to those of the Test coach, Andy Flower. But the appointment also failed to reflect quite how divergent the formats had become in the interim, a process exacerbated by Trevor Bayliss’s desire not to mix his messages on the Test front while his white-ball world-beaters were going hell for leather.

“It was the events of Strauss’s first match in charge, against West Indies at Sabina Park, that set in motion everything else that came to pass, and demonstrates the simple differences that a change of regime can offer”

And if that meant that Silverwood was overburdened from the outset, then Giles’ decision, at the start of the last English summer, to do away with Ed Smith as England’s independent national selector was trebly baffling – and all because one or two players, most notably Stuart Broad, had grown tired of Smith’s over-complicated meddlings.At that precise moment, with Covid still raging and with a limited ability to tinker teams beyond their already expanded training bubbles, there was some logic in accepting that Smith’s role could be furloughed (to use the vernacular) rather than made redundant in the literal sense.But to judge by the frazzled selection calls made throughout a wretched Ashes tour – most notably the omissions of Broad and James Anderson at Brisbane and the dumping of Jack Leach in Adelaide, but also the uncritical acceptance that England’s fringe players couldn’t be shoehorned into an otherwise pointless Lions fixture against Australia A – it’s clear that some external influence would have been helpful to freshen up the stale air inside England’s bubble.And so, in that regard as well as several others, the return of Andrew Strauss as England’s white knight is clearly a welcome development. The timing is ironic, too, for it was in the lead-up to another new year Caribbean tour in January 2009 that Strauss first rode to England’s rescue after a very public humiliation. On that occasion, he and Flower picked up the pieces of the Kevin Pietersen-Peter Moores debacle, and set in place the standards that would in 2011, almost two years to the day from his appointment, culminate in England’s first series win in Australia since 1986-87, and their most-recent individual Test victory Down Under.Strauss and Flower didn’t oversee an immediate uptick in fortunes, far from it. But whereas England have become inured to their recent batting disasters – so much so that Silverwood infamously dared to find “positives” after their Ashes-surrendering 68-all-out in Melbourne – it was the events of Strauss’s first match in charge, against West Indies at Sabina Park, that set in motion everything else that came to pass, and demonstrates to this day the simple differences that a change of regime can offer.Andrew Strauss previously enjoyed a successful stint as England’s director of cricket•Getty ImagesAlastair Cook, an at-times incredulous witness to England’s inadequacies during his stints as a BT Sport pundit this winter, was a part of the team that got routed for 51 on the fourth and final afternoon of that first Test in February 2009. “We were told that was totally unacceptable as a playing group,” he said, reflecting after the Hobart defeat confirmed this winter’s 4-0 scoreline. “It was not good enough given the resources we have and the ability we had. Do something about it, or we’ll find someone else.”The fall guy on that occasion was Ian Bell – and coincidentally, he is the player that Ollie Pope most resembles in technique and also, at this precise juncture of his faltering career, in temperament. Bell was famously banished to the beach for boxing sessions in a bid to “toughen up”, before returning to become the player that England needed to meet their heightened standards in the push to world No. 1 status.It’s too simplistic to suggest that history is about to repeat itself simply with a change at the helm, but Pope – and Zak Crawley, and Dan Lawrence, and other young talents whose progress has stalled in the past 18 months – does not deserve for the message from on high to be one of “stuff it, we’re all doomed”. Even a glimmer of hope can go a long way for an ambitious sportsman.And that’s where Strauss comes back in, to attempt what he has done in various England guises throughout his career – from the single-handed manner in which he won the 2009 Ashes, to the exhaustive military-style planning that went into the 2010-11 triumph (a win that looks more incredible with every passing failure since), right through to his initial three-year stint in the very role that Giles took on in 2018, when Strauss’s awful family circumstances demanded that he step away from a job half done.It’s the fate of an executive that you are judged on the toughness of your calls, and therefore not everything that Strauss did in his initial tenure met with favour, either at the time or in hindsight. But you cannot fault the clarity of his decision-making, from the sacking of Peter Moores, just days into the job (a point that won’t have been lost on Silverwood…), to the final excommunication of Kevin Pietersen, to the relentless white-ball focus that delivered so gloriously in 2019, even if the collateral damage is now coming under scrutiny.For that reason, some might argue that Strauss is the wrong man to put back in charge – but really, who better to row back on a project that has served its time than the man who instigated it in the first place? At the very least, at a time when the ECB boardroom has never been more lacking in cricketing nous, Strauss can stroll back in with the officer-class plausibility that still cuts a disproportionate dash among county chairmen, and get things done simply by dint of his proven reputation.That, for better or worse, is the system as it currently stands. It can be changed, but only a select few have the clout to make it happen. Strauss, former England captain and knight of the realm, may yet succeed where Giles, more of a loyal foot soldier, so clearly failed.

Visitors crash the party through dominant knocks from Joe Root and Dan Lawrence

Cameron Ponsonby16-Mar-2022As you get off the plane in Barbados and walk into arrivals, the first two posters you’re greeted with are of Garry Sobers and Rihanna. Cricket and entertainment. Sounds good.Today, with thousands of England fans in attendance, the two combined as Joe Root and Dan Lawrence’s dominant 164-run stand off 269 balls took over proceedings, much to the joy of those in attendance at the Kensington Oval in the London Borough of Barbados.”He’ll be delighted to be not out overnight following another good hundred last week,” Marcus Trescothick, England’s batting coach, said of Root’s unbeaten 119. “[For him] to do it all again he’ll be delighted. It’s a real pleasure to sit there and watch it unfold and see how he goes about it.Related

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“To see him batting in the fashion he has, the mental discipline and approach he’s putting into his batting to come back and start fresh every time… it’s an honour to stand there and throw at him and then to sit back and watch him all day.”Trescothick was also glowing in his praise of Lawrence’s performance, who scored a career-best 91 before being at caught cover off what was scheduled to be the penultimate ball of the day’s play.”Absolutely,” Trescothick replied when asked whether England would be focusing on the positives from Lawrence’s innings rather than the pain of narrowly missing out on a maiden Test match hundred. “You always take the positives. And then we try to understand what happened there? Did anything change? Those are the sort of questions we’ll sit down and talk about.”But this was a party that West Indies allowed to happen. Root was caught behind off what seemed like an inside edge on 23, only for it not to be reviewed. He was dropped down the leg side by Josh Da Silva on 34. And on 87, he should’ve been run out by John Campbell. To make matters worse, Lawrence was also dropped on 72, as Alzarri Joseph let a head-high slip catch split his hands and run away to the boundary.As a result, having shared an awkward drink or two with England in a turgid first session and shared a pleasant dinner with them in the second, in the third, West Indies allowed Root and Lawrence to invite themselves back to theirs for afters and watched on as the two raided the drinks cabinet and fridge in equal measure.”Kraigg, you got anything I could eat? Starving.”The runs flowed on the pitch as quickly as the Banks lager and rum punch flowed off it. It was loud. Lawrence’s leg-side flicks were loud. Root’s pulls and reverse sweeps were loud. The England fans. Loud.For the most part, this wasn’t the stereotypical Barmy Army showing that consists solely of the continued dirge of just repeating “Barmy Army!” *dooph dooph* “Barmy Army!” *dooph dooph* – rather 8000 people spending their day with one foot in the land of Sobers and the other in the land of Rihanna, just as they were told to on arrival. It was a party.Of course, as the day came to a close, “Sweet Caroline” got one more play than would otherwise be deemed socially acceptable and the dooph dooph chants made their return. The sun going down at the end of a day at the cricket is like the moment on most evenings out where the lights go up and reveal the mass of destruction, sweat and alcohol that the darkness had previously hidden. If anything, this way around is better.The highlight of the day from an English perspective was the noise that greeted Root’s century as the Greenidge and Haynes Stand morphed into the Kop. The open-air nature of cricket grounds means it is not often you get that visceral echo that is so synonymous with football grounds, but here you did.”It was brilliant, wasn’t it?” Trescothick said. “A real English contingent throughout the island at the moment and great support throughout. We’re lucky that we get great support wherever we go and to see it here, it was pretty much a home game for us so it’s really nice to have.”The Brits were abroad. And they were rowdy. Both off the pitch and on.

New era began with a loss, and focus on bowlers than batting depth – Buttler will have to learn quickly ahead of T20 World Cup

Matt Roller08-Jul-2022It was an incongruous handover. “Today, I start my new life as an England fan,” Eoin Morgan wrote in his programme notes for his old side’s T20I series against India. “I think for now it makes sense to detach myself from the England set-up a little bit, to give Jos [Buttler] and Motty [Matthew Mott, the white-ball coach] some room.”But it was hard to escape Morgan’s presence at the Ageas Bowl on Thursday night. Rather than relaxing at home with a glass of red wine in England’s first game since his international retirement, Morgan was on site in a crisp white shirt, watching on from the Sky Sports “pod” on the boundary edge.At the start of the 12th over, when Chris Jordan returned to bowl his second over, former England batter Nick Knight was thrown on commentary. “Morgan has gone to his most experienced bowler because he knows the importance of this partnership,” he said, before correcting himself: “Buttler, even…” The change of captaincy has loomed for some time, but it will take some getting used to.Related

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Buttler has led England before in white-ball cricket – five times in T20Is and nine times in ODIs – but this was his first game in full-time charge, and represented a reality check as to the scale of the role. He has a significant burden on his workload in this format in particular – opening the batting and keeping wicket as well as now captaining – and this was the first of a dozen games in a 25-day window which will be a significant test.The first obvious difference of the Buttler era was in selection. Morgan prioritised batting depth at all costs throughout his tenure, but under Buttler in the first T20I against India in Southampton, England fielded an extra bowling option compared to the sides they played throughout last year’s World Cup, with Tymal Mills unusually high at No. 9.”That will develop over time,” Morgan said of their balance. “There’s flexibility depending on how we see fit.”But the biggest change was simply his position behind the stumps, rather than in the field. Morgan would typically field at extra cover, giving him easy access to his bowlers throughout an over to discuss plans. “I always felt I wanted to give the bowler clear direction at the top of his mark,” he explained on air.Buttler attacked by using Moeen Ali in the powerplay, and got mixed results•PA Images via Getty ImagesButtler, by contrast, generally opted to leave his bowlers to the task at hand, delegating responsibility to two senior players in Moeen Ali and Jordan when he felt a message needed to be relayed. At times, bowlers appeared isolated: during Matt Parkinson’s second over when deep extra cover, long-off and long-on were in place, there were no red shirts within 20 yards of the bowler.”If you need to talk, it’s easy to just to do the legwork as a wicketkeeper and touch base at the start of overs,” Buttler said. “A lot of the time either Chris Jordan or Moeen Ali is at mid-off or mid-on relaying messages as well. But I like the bowlers to take some ownership; I like them to try and lead that as much as they can.”And of course, doing that legwork, we can have good conversations as to what we’re trying to achieve.”Buttler made several attacking moves, not least opting to dangle the carrot to India in the powerplay by giving the third and fifth overs to Moeen. It was a qualified success: Moeen removed Rohit Sharma with an arm ball which took his outside edge, and had Ishan Kishan caught top-edging a sweep to short fine leg. However, he returned 2 for 26 in the powerplay, being swept for consecutive fours by Rohit and launched over long-on by Deepak Hooda for back-to-back sixes.Buttler had spoken in the build-up about looking to solve England’s death-bowling problems by taking early wickets, and was successful up to a point: the final six overs cost 48 runs as Jordan, in particular, thrived by bowling hard lengths, but India still managed 198 after putting England’s new-ball bowlers under pressure with their early intent.Buttler was bowled first ball as full-time England captain•Getty ImagesWith the bat, England fell a long way short, and Buttler conceded that India’s “fantastic new-ball spell” had changed the game. Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Arshdeep Singh both found prodigious swing with the new ball in stark contrast to England’s seamers; in typical Morgan style, Buttler suggested that might have been different if they had “hit one to the stands to reduce the swing”.Buttler himself is among the world’s most in-form white-ball batter after following up his MVP-winning IPL season with two stunning innings against Netherlands last month. But he could use a score in one of this weekend’s T20Is against India to remove any suggestion that his batting will suffer under the burden of his new role.There was not much he could have done about his first-ball duck on Thursday night at the hands of Bhuvneshwar, whose hooping inswinger tailed in sharply to crash into leg stump. It was his fourth duck in his last seven innings as captain, but there has been no kind of pattern to those dismissals, spread out across a four-year period.Morgan’s one-word description of Buttler’s captaincy at the innings break was “exceptional”, but it will take time for both of them to become used to their respective new roles. They are close friends, and live nearby too, but Buttler’s challenge is to find his own voice and continue England’s evolution; with just over three months until the World Cup, he will have to learn quickly.

India have adopted a refreshingly positive approach in T20Is of late, but a few wrinkles still remain to be ironed out

Karthik Krishnaswamy25-Aug-2022Pakistan, Dubai. Just under a year ago, this combination of opponent and venue tripped India up at the men’s T20 World Cup. That defeat began India’s slide towards an early exit from the tournament, and left them needing to rethink their approach to T20Is.On Sunday, an India side managed by a different coaching group and led by a different captain will meet Pakistan once again in Dubai. The team won’t be too different to the one that featured in last year’s meeting, but it’s been playing a different style of T20 over the last few months.Consider their phase-wise scoring rates. Considering only matches in which they have batted first – and haven’t had a target dictating their approach – it’s amply clear that India have been scoring significantly quicker in every phase than they used to.