If it isn’t sandpaper rubbing South Africans the wrong way about Australians it’s a vicious virus.
Telford Vice | Cape Town
TO the long list of reasons why South Africans detest Australians, add a Test series that will not be played as scheduled. Until Monday, it seemed probable that Australia would agree to honour their commitment to play three matches in the country in March and April. On Tuesday came confirmation that the venture was off. Or, to resort to the weasel word that was used, “postponed”.
With that went around USD2-million in broadcast revenue CSA would have earned, along with the assurance created by Sri Lanka’s Covid-free trip in December and January, and a current women’s series featuring Pakistan, that Cricket South Africa had recovered from England’s virus vexed visit in November and December. Also gone is any hope that cricket in the time of the pandemic might give sportminded South Africans pause for thought about the irrational and unwarranted dislike they reserve for Australians.
The series was called off less than 24 hours after Cyril Ramaphosa, South Africa’s president, told the country that the daily number of new cases of the virus had eased enough to suspend a ban on the sale of alcohol and public access to beaches, and to relax a nationwide nighttime curfew by two hours. South Africa recorded 21,832 new coronavirus infections on January 8. On Monday, thanks to a tightening of lockdown regulations on December 14, only 2,548 additional cases were reported.
But even the fact that the number of infections had crashed by 88.33% in the past 24 days was always going to struggle to cut ice in Australia, where seven tested positive on Monday — exactly 364 times fewer than South Africa’s number of new cases on the same day. On Sunday, when 4,525 contracted Covid in South Africa, Perth went into a five-day lockdown that gave residents just four reasons to leave their homes and led to border restrictions with neighbouring states. And all because a single security guard working at a quarantine hotel in Perth was found to have the disease. Given South Africa’s exponentially bigger problems with containing the virus, there can be little surprise that Australia have chosen not to come.
“Due to the public health situation in South Africa, which includes a second wave and new variant of the virus, and following extensive due diligence with medical experts, it has become clear that traveling from Australia to South Africa at this current time poses an unacceptable level of health and safety risk to our players, support staff and the community,” Nick Hockley, CA’s interim chief executive, was quoted as saying in a release.
That is a fair argument for staying away, and it should be noted that travelling to South Africa would have gone against the Australian government’s advice. And no-one should say the Aussies made their decision flippantly as it complicates their path to earn the right to take on New Zealand in the inaugural World Test Championship final in England in June.
But CSA does have reason to be unhappy about the way the Australians strung it along, making it jump through ever more unreasonable hoops in the hopes of sealing the deal. Justifiably, CSA’s response stopped short of calling the Australians cowardly spoilt brats, but not by much: “CSA wishes to record its immense disappointment at the news. The safety of players is always paramount and over the past few months CSA held many detailed discussions with CA regarding Covid-19 protocols. These discussions included assessing and managing the Covid-19 risks and consulting with a range of leading medical experts including the South African ministerial Covid advisory committee. CSA worked hard to meet the changing demands of our Australian counterparts.”
The CSA release quoted Graeme Smith, the director of cricket, as saying: “This was set to be the longest tour in a bio-secure environment (BSE), comprising a three-match Test series that was scheduled to begin with Australia’s arrival later in the month. So to be informed about the CA decision at the 11th hour is frustrating.”
Shuaib Manjra, CSA’s medical officer, detailed some of the measures that had and would have been taken: “The protocols we had proposed to CA were unprecedented. Firstly we had agreed that our own Proteas team would enter the BSE 14 days prior to the arrival of the Australian team, thus altering their planning during the current tour of Pakistan. Among some of the other key arrangements made were that all four areas (two hotels and two venues) had a protocol to implement a strict BSE with no contact with anybody outside this area. We subsequently agreed to two separate BSEs and had granted Australia full and exclusive use of the Irene Country Lodge [near Centurion], which we shared with Sri Lanka, with a minimum staff present on site. In terms of the arrangements the Proteas were to move to a separate hotel altogether. Furthermore all hotel staff, match officials and even bus drivers were to enter the BSE 14 days prior to Australia’s arrival. In addition CSA had also committed to importing an Australian tracking system at great cost to ensure proper tracking of close contacts in the event of a positive test. The touring team was also going to be granted VIP access through the airports, after government intervention to ensure this privilege.”
Pholetsi Moseki, CSA’s acting chief executive, also laid in: “It is indeed sad that after all the engagements and effort made to ensure a secure visit by our Australian counterparts, the tour has been derailed. CSA has incurred significant costs related to the planning stages and the cancellation of the tour represents a serious financial loss. In this challenging period for cricket and its member countries we believe the stance taken by CA is regrettable and will have a serious impact on the sustainability of the less wealthy cricket-playing nations.”
Australia’s demands are why South Africa’s T20 squad for their series in Pakistan, which will follow the second Test in Rawalpindi starting on Thursday, includes only four of the players in the Test squad. The rest had to return home in time to go into quarantine, as per the Aussies’ conditions.
What now for South Africa? Pakistan are due in the country for a white-ball tour in April. Might they be persuaded to arrive early for a Test series? Probably not: the PSL will be played from February 20 to March 22.
If it isn’t sandpaper rubbing South Africans the wrong way about Australians it’s a vicious virus. Before that, it was Shane Warne resorting to something close to mental cruelty in his clashes with Daryll Cullinan. And Merv Hughes levelling a bat at a spectator at the Wanderers, where fans asked Adam Gilchrist who fathered his children. Pat Symcox had an entire roast chicken thrown at him — among other, less tasty missiles — while he was fielding on the boundary at the SCG. David Warner looked up from the slips at St George’s Park to see fans wearing masks depicting the face of his wife’s former lover. Faf du Plessis was hounded through Adelaide airport, in a rolling confrontation with television crews that turned physically nasty, because of a messy moment involving a mint and a cricket ball.
With Covid, as with so much else, Australians and South Africans might as well be on different planets. Perhaps this is confirmation that they are. It used to be that you could take the Aussies out of Australia, but you couldn’t take Australia out of the Aussies. Now, it seems, neither is possible.
First published by Cricbuzz.
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