Vince van der Bijl – Bulletproof Truth

How cricket built a healthy, and evolving, relationship with electronic umpiring

“We need to move past this assumption that the best on-field match officials are also your best television match officials.” – Simon Taufel

Telford Vice / Cape Town

“TV umpire to director, we have a review for …” It’s a step in the process that starts when players are dissatisfied with the on-field umpires’ decision. Or when those umpires are unsure. So the umpire upstairs, using video evidence and gizmos, takes a look and hands down the verdict.

The mechanism has become an integral part of the modern game. Many sports have embraced electronic officiating, but none has done so as well as cricket. Crucial to the system’s integrity is trust in the technology, credible, confident communication, and transparency.

The original electronics were vetted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and relaying the relevant information and umpires’ deliberations to the watching public is a matter of connecting the officials to screens and speakers. What matters more than anything, then, is the human element: what umpires say and how they say it.

“The two biggest skills required in TV match officiating are composure and effective communication,” Simon Taufel, the former elite umpire, told Cricbuzz before plucking an analogy from the skies: “Businesses that need to focus on communicating effectively, something like air traffic control, use agreed terminology and work with non-English speaking people.

“We have to work with the lowest common denominator. While that might seem too basic, if we don’t do that we don’t have effective communication. We run an international game, and English is not something that comes easily to a lot of people.”

Umpires’ familiar DRS script makes them sound as if they’re on autopilot, but consistency is part of the point. To be believable and believed, what they say must be repeatable. And understood by all involved and by all who have an interest in the outcome.

“It can come across as robotic, but when you have very clear, agreed communication phrases of introduction, identification, requests and acknowledgement, then you leave very little room for human error and misunderstanding,” Taufel said.

He knows what he’s talking about. Having built a sterling reputation as an international umpire from January 1999 to August 2012 — he was awarded the David Shepherd Trophy a record five times consecutively — Taufel served as the ICC’s umpire performance and training manager from November 2012 to August 2016.

His tenure at the ICC coincided with those of senior administrators David Richardson, Geoff Allardice and Vince van der Bijl. With the input of leading umpires of the era like Steve Davis and Ian Gould, they transformed what had arrived in November 1992 as basic electronic umpiring and was first deployed as DRS in July 2008. The joke inside the ICC in the early days was that DRS stood for “the David Richardson System” because of the then chief executive’s drive to improve and refine it.

The tinkering continues. In March 2022 it was decided the television umpire would keep an eye on no-balls. That meant part of the DRS script became “I have checked the front foot and it is a fair delivery”. The change saved time and allowed on-field umpires to keep their eye on the action unfolding in front. As logical as that update to the playing conditions is, it shuttled between various committees of the ICC and the MCC — the custodians of the “laws” — and back for years before it was adopted.

A previous major step was taken in November 2014, when communication between umpires and broadcasters was first relayed to television viewers. “We held off on doing that for a long time on the basis that, quite often, a good decision can be ruined by a poor explanation,” Taufel said. “You become protective of your match officials to ensure you don’t fall over in that space.”

There were two challenges, Taufel said: “Number one was for the match officials to clearly articulate what they wanted, why they were making the decision, and to sell the decision verbally. The second was getting the commentators to shut up and let the TV match official talk and explain what they’re doing and why they’re doing it. It was a leap of faith but it worked.”

Spectacularly well, as was proved again in a game between Kolkata Knight Riders and Royal Challengers Bangalore at Eden Gardens on Sunday. Virat Kohli felt the slow full toss he had slapped to Harshit Rana for a return catch had reached him above his waist, and was thus high enough to be ruled a no-ball. The on-field umpires, Akshay Totre and Vinod Seshan, deemed that a possibility, and — before Kohli demanded they do — asked television official Michael Gough to investigate. Replays showed Kohli was correct about the ball’s height. But they also proved he was well outside his crease when he met the delivery, which made his argument irrelevant.

As “law” 41.7.1 makes clear: “Any delivery, which passes or would have passed, without pitching, above waist height of the striker standing upright at the popping crease, is unfair. Whenever such a delivery is bowled, the umpire shall call and signal no-ball.”

Kohli’s front foot was the best part of a metre in front of the crease. His back foot was also out of his ground. The gizmos produced data that said the ball would have reached him a dozen centimetres below his waist had he been “standing upright at the popping crease”.

Gough rightly gave Kohli out, triggering enough fury from the batter to cost him half his match fee. Much of the subsequent heat has been aimed, unfairly, at the umpires. Instead, Kohli should have been upset with himself for falling prey to Rana’s canny sucker punch — and for his own lack of knowledge on what constitutes a waist-high no-ball. Kohli was wrong. The officials were correct, and they had the data to prove it.

“The biggest challenge with the television umpire role is that once a decision is referred or reviewed, we never get it wrong,” Taufel said. To that end, Taufel — who now manages umpires in franchise leagues — foresees a category of officials who make their decisions from behind a screen exclusively.

“In the ILT20 this year we had two specialist television officials, who did 17 matches each. We had not only live comms to air, but two video cameras in the box so that people could see what they were doing as well as hear what they were doing. They were also able to have the odd exchange with the commentator.

“Matching the best people with the best technology to get the best outcomes is a must. We need to move past this assumption that the best on-field match officials are also your best television match officials. I think that’s incorrect. I worked in printing before I became an umpire and my best printer didn’t make my best foreman.”

Clearly, technology isn’t done with umpiring. So far cricket has managed the relationship better than sports like football, which is frequently mired in Video Assistant Referee controversies. Nottingham Forest were denied what they considered three clear penalties in their 2-0 EPL loss to Everton at Goodison Park on Sunday. Forest alleged publicly that the VAR official, Stuart Attwell, supported Luton Town — who like Forest are struggling to avoid relegation. “If we were in another country we’d start speaking about conspiracy,” Nuno Espírito Santo, Forest’s manager, said. In cricket, Kohli’s futile rant — routine by football standards — is as bad as it gets.

“We’re lucky that we have a lot more line decisions than most other sports,” Taufel said. “Rugby is a very technical game, even soccer. But we still have a lot of … you use the term controversy. I use differences of opinion because people see things from their own perspective. When we talk about clean catches or obstruction, we’re talking about wilful intent or a definition.”

And talking in clear, consistent, credible, confident communication.

Cricbuzz

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Kingsmead returns to green glory days

“I’ve never seen the colour of the grass at Kingsmead like it is right now.” – Keshav Maharaj

Telford Vice | Durban

OLD-TIMERS joke that the only way to tell the pitch from the outfield at Kingsmead used to be by locating the stumps and the creases. Then you took guard to face Neil Adcock, Mike Procter, Vince van der Bijl, or other fine fast bowlers on a surface that rivalled a snooker table for greenness.

But Kingsmead’s emerald fire has dwindled. Tests here have become attritional struggles against spin and the elements. This is where, in August 2012, South Africa and New Zealand bowled and faced only 99.4 overs in a game ruined by a sodden outfield. It’s also where Rangana Herath took match figures of 9/128 in December 2011 to seal Sri Lanka’s first win in the country. Almost eight years later, the Lankans returned to Durban to spark what would be a 2-0 series triumph — the only Test rubber won by an Asian team in South Africa. Indeed, conditions at Kingsmead have become un-South African enough for the home side to have won only one of their last nine Tests here.

This time, it seems, things might be different. Dean Elgar and Keshav Maharaj, a local, mind, have both spoken of the unusual amount of grass, and its colour, they have seen on the pitch being prepared for the match.

Thereby hangs a theory. Kingsmead hasn’t hosted a Test since Sri Lanka’s win in February 2019, and South Africa have since played 10 matches in the format at home. The ground staff can’t do anything about rain and bad light, which are both frequent factors in matches here and seem set to feature again, but they can try to ensure the surface gives the home side’s fast bowlers something to work with and that it lasts five days. Not doing so, on both counts, would seem detrimental to the ground’s future as a Test venue. It seems they have taken that possibility seriously enough to relay the table.

Even so, Elgar might grimace at the unfair irony of Kingsmead finally delivering a seamer’s pitch when most of his first-choice fast bowlers are not around. Kagiso Rabada, Marco Jansen, Anrich Nortjé and Lungi Ngidi, along with Rassie van der Dussen and Aiden Markram, have all high-tailed it to the IPL. The unfortunates among us who don’t somehow consider professional cricket a profession could see this as betrayal of national duty. The rest of us accept it as a business decision made by people whose primary motivation for playing cricket is to be paid. Would any of them turn out for South Africa for free?

Of course, that’s not Bangladesh’s problem. They have to find a way to maintain the momentum generated by their stunning 2-1 win in the ODI series, their first in any format in South Africa. It will help that seven of the players who helped achieve that famous success are in the Test squad, and that Tamim Iqbal, Taskin Ahmed and Mehidy Hasan — who starred in the ODIs — are among them. It will also help that, with Herath and Allan Donald in their coaching staff, they have both bowling bases covered. And that Russell Domingo knows Kingsmead as well as any coach. And that, thanks to the IPL, which has taken 128 Test caps out of South Africa’s squad, the visitors are the more experienced side.

But the temporary return home for family reasons of Shakib al Hasan, as iconic a player for Bangladesh as anyone is for any other team, is a setback. Happily, he is due back for the second Test at St George’s Park, which starts on April 7.

Bangladesh have lost all six Tests they have played in South Africa, five of them by an innings. But they have also never played a match in the format at Kingsmead, where India and Sri Lanka have won all three Tests they’ve played since December 2010. Conditions this time may mitigate against a fourth victory for Asian side in five matches in Durban, but that doesn’t mean South Africa will anticipate a lesser challenge.

With the calamity of the ODI series still fresh, and considering South Africa have lost the first Test seven times in their last 11 series — and in both of their most recent rubbers, at home to India in December and in Christchurch in February — the visitors will know their time is now.

When: Thursday, 10am Local Time

Where: Kingsmead, Durban

What to expect: More green grass than has become the norm for a Test here. Even if that is the case, the primary challenge for batters early in the match will likely by swing rather than seam. Then, as the surface slows, spin will come into the equation.

Team news

South Africa: Stand by for changes galore, what with the IPL defections. Keegan Petersen’s return from Covid-19 was always likely, and we could see an overdue debut for Ryan Rickelton

Possible XI: Dean Elgar (capt), Sarel Erwee, Keegan Petersen, Temba Bavuma, Ryan Rickelton, Kyle Verreynne, Wiaan Mulder, Keshav Maharaj, Glenton Stuurman, Lutho Sipamla, Duanne Olivier

Bangladesh: Tamim Iqbal is set to come in for Shadman Ismail, who scored 53 runs in four innings in New Zealand in January.

Possible XI: Tamim Iqbal, Mahmudul Hasan Joy, Nazmul Hossain, Mominul Haque (capt), Mushfiqur Rahim, Yasir Ali, Liton Kumar, Mehedy Hasan, Shoriful Islam, Ebadat Hossain, Taskin Ahmed

What they said:

“I’ve never seen the colour of the grass at Kingsmead like it is right now. Traditionally Kingsmead spins, and I would hope it does from my personal point of view. But I think it will be a decent, traditional pitch.” – Keshav Maharaj on Kingsmead’s return to greenness.

“Experience-wise we are ahead but they are playing at home, so they will get some advantage. Both teams will have advantages but whoever plays good cricket for five days will win.” – Mominul Haque walks a diplomatic tightrope.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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Baboo Ebrahim: Smiling through the sadness

Through lack of opportunity, not talent or skill, Ebrahim had just 48 chances to shine at first-class level.

TELFORD VICE | Cape Town

HAD life, cricket and everything else been more just, this piece would have been much richer in detail and description of great feats. Instead, the cricket life of Ismail “Baboo” Ebrahim, who has died in Durban at 73, will be known as well as it should be only to those who played with and against him, or watched him play.

His passing is a tragedy to those who loved him. Another tragedy is that many more who would surely have come to love him, or at least have recognised him as the pre-eminent South Africa spinner of the age, were denied that joy by the laws of the day. Apartheid barred sport that was not organised racially, simultaneously elevating white sport — and everything else that was white — above all else and subjugating, brutally, the rest. That meant the lives of more than 90% of South Africans were viciously stunted.

As a South African of Asian descent, Ebrahim was among them. And so his potential went unrealised, as did that of so many others. But his legend is as large as it could be.

He resolved to become a left-arm spinner after seeing, from the “non-white” pen in the stands at Kingsmead, England’s Johnny Wardle cleanbowl Roy McLean, a dashing South African, through the gate in January 1957. Wardle was unusually creative for a spinner of the time — not to mention for a Yorkshireman — because he bowled wrist spin as well as the orthodox variety. As did Ebrahim, who became a wizard of flight as well as turn: still a rarity for a South African spinner.

In February 1970, When Ebrahim was 24, Bill Lawry’s Australians came to Durban to play a Test in what would be South Africa’s last series before the were banished for 22 years because of apartheid. Ebrahim went to the nets to watch them practice. And to ask if he could have a bowl. A brown man? Bowling to white foreigners? In South Africa in 1970? Who did he think he was? But the Australians shooed away the security vultures, and Ebrahim was given a crack. He bowled Ian Redpath, caught the eye of Ashley Mallett, who stayed in touch for years afterwards, and reportedly earned Ian Chappell’s opinion of him as the best spinner in the country.

Six years later he played for a South African Invitation XI against the composite International Wanderers on a Kingsmead pitch so typically green and nasty that Vince van der Bijl, Clive Rice and Eddie Barlow took all 10 wickets inside 40 overs, or before Ebrahim could be tossed the ball. He made up for that in the second innings, bowling 29.1 overs and taking 6/66. Mike Denness, Greg Chappell and Bob Taylor were among his victims.

By then white clubs were making efforts to sign up members of other races, and Ebrahim was among those who did so — to the chagrin of his more politically minded peers, who held to the line that there could be “no normal sport in an abnormal society” like South Africa’s. But his best days were behind him by the time he played his first match for the white Natal side: he turned 32 on the second day of that game, against Rhodesia in Bulawayo in November 1978.

White contemporaries like Alan Kourie, a slow left-armer of flight and guile but not much turn and four-and-a-half years Ebrahim’s junior, played 127 first-class matches. Ebrahim, through lack of opportunity, not talent or skill, had just 48 chances to shine at that level. The Transvaal team Kourie played for called the Wanderers home, and appeared on television wherever they went. Ebrahim and his black and brown comrades toiled away in relative obscurity on ill-appointed grounds, their exploits covered only by reporters from newspapers that had exclusively black and brown readerships.

And yet it could have been so different. Kourie is of Lebanese heritage. So, unlike Ebrahim, he was adjudged white enough to escape the stroke of an apartheid aparatchick’s pen that would have condemned him as too dark to play with those of paler skin.

Ebrahim sought solace from his reality, and took the chance to earn some decent money, by playing in the Lancashire Leagues. But sometimes reality came to him. In the summer of 1974-75 the great Rohan Kanhai was in South Africa to play four matches for the non-racial Transvaal team. He scored three centuries in five innings, one of them against Ebrahim’s Natal. Ebrahim didn’t dismiss the West Indian in the two innings in which he bowled to him, but he took 2/18 from 21 overs in one and 2/90 from 41 in the other. What might have been had they tussled in Test cricket?

We can never know, although we do know that Ebrahim dismissed Gordon Greenidge and Viv Richards — as well as Collis King and Carlisle Best — in the twilight zone of a Masters Cup semi-final at the beautiful Brabourne in Mumbai in March 1995, when he was four months past his 50th birthday.

Another victim of era of Ebrahim’s prime, newspaper editor Donald Woods, whose association with activist Steve Biko cost him some of his white privilege and forced him into exile, wrote in the 1993 edition of Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack that Ebrahim would have been a star in “any first-class arena”. Biko paid a far higher price than Woods for being loudly, proudly, thoughtfully black: he was murdered by the state in 1977.

Such were the horrors of the time in which Ebrahim forged his career. But, to see him in his later years in the president’s suite at Kingsmead, where he became something of an éminence grise, you would never have guessed. A twinkle danced in his eye. His smile was as warm as Durban’s summer sun. He had retained his impish, fluid slightness. His hair, by then thoroughly grey, slumped lankly over his head, lending him the louche look of a rock star freshly tumbled out of bed. He had presence. You knew, without knowing, that this man had done great things.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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Race wounds still raw in South African cricket

“Those injustices were done to us as blacks. I doubt that any white player out there has ever been called a monkey.” – Geoff Toyana

TELFORD VICE | Cape Town

A statement on Tuesday in support of Lungi Ngidi’s stance on the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement has thrown into stark relief the gaping racial divisions in South African cricket. The release lists 31 former players and five current coaches as signatories. Not one of them is white. Neither have any white current or former national players volunteered their backing for Ngidi.

The document, which former Titans player and Lions coach Geoff Toyana told Cricbuzz was the work of “a collective”, seeks to “invite our fellow white cricketers to join in this move to defend human dignity”. Had any whites been approached to back the initiative? “No, but that’s a very good question,” Toyana said. “Those injustices were done to us as blacks. I doubt that any white player out there has ever been called a monkey.”

The atmosphere around the game has been racially charged in the wake of Ngidi being asked, during an online press conference last Monday, whether South Africa’s current players were talking about supporting BLM. “That’s definitely something that we will discuss once we are together in person,” he said. “We have spoken about it and everyone is well aware of what’s going on. It’s a difficult one because we are not together, so it’s hard to discuss. But once we get back to playing that is definitely something we have to address as a team.

“As a nation as well, we have a past that is very difficult because of racial discrimination. So it’s definitely something we will be addressing as a team and if we are not, it’s something I will bring up. It’s something that we need to take very seriously and, like the rest of the world is doing, make a stand.”

That earned Ngidi disapproval from former white players, who with no apparent evidence took his view to mean he was telling his peers what to do. “What nonsense is this,” Pat Symcox posted on social media. “[Ngidi] must take his own stand if he wishes. Stop trying to get the Proteas involved in his belief.”

In perhaps the only note of notable white support for Ngidi, Vince van der Bijl, a former fast bowler, disagreed: “BLM does not say other lives don’t matter … Respect is allowing others to have their opinions. You are allowed yours. We do not have the space to state all the things that we talk about. And agree on. Saying one thing does not exclude other beliefs. We ache for so many things in this country. Hopefully we can help the healing as opposed to widen the divides.”

Tuesday’s statement said: “We note … that the most outspoken criticism directed at Ngidi has come via former players such as Pat Symcox, Boeta Dippenaar, Rudi Steyn, Brian McMillan and others, and we urge that their views be challenged. We are not surprised at their comments.

“Given South Africa’s well-known past, black cricketers have borne the brunt of subtle and overt racist behaviour for many years, including from some colleagues. Consequently, there is a need to understand how white privilege feeds into the perpetuation of these old attitudes and assumptions.

“Our attitude, mistakenly, we now believe, has always been to say: ‘These are teething problems, and that these will be resolved if we are patient’. But after almost three decades of cricket unity, the views expressed from one side of the racial divide are still very much part of our lives, and we now believe: ‘Teething problems cannot be allowed to continue for this long’ …

“We represent, or have represented, South Africa on merit. Far too many white South Africans cannot accept that black cricketers have proved, time without end, that they are good enough to play at the highest level.”

South Africa’s 2019 rugby World Cup triumph, achieved with a squad captained by the black Siya Kolisi and that included 11 black or brown players — six of whom started the final — was proof that diversity bred strength, the statement said.

“We want to remind South Africans that, as recently as 2017, we were told that a South African sister sport, rugby, was ‘dead’ — killed by ‘transformation’. But guess what? South African rugby won a World Cup last year. We cannot recall anyone suggesting that the victory was due to transformation. Why is transformation always rammed down the throats of national teams when they lose, but never when they win?

“… We are determined that future generations should not have to experience the pain we have had to endure, and that no South African cricketer should be discriminated against in the future. Racism is a global problem and, as the great Michael Holding explained, we can no longer just keep on laughing, grimacing and moving on.”

Former Test fast bowler Holding, now a television commentator, made an impassioned plea for racial justice last week during coverage of the first Test between England and West Indies in Southampton.

Racial unity in South African cricket was proclaimed in 1991, but the game continues to struggle to properly represent the country’s black and brown people — who make up more than 90% of the population — on the field. Of the country’s 345 men’s Test players, 316 — more than 90% — have been white.

Makhaya Ntini, the only one among South Africa’s nine black Test players to earn 50 or more caps, was among the signatories of Tuesday’s release. The brown Hashim Amla, who played 124 Tests, was not. Neither was the brown Russell Domingo, the first South Africa head coach who is not white.

Such colour coding is grim. Not that it was, for the first 100 years and more of cricket’s history in South Africa, difficult to say which race was winning. But the match situation is changing — to the chagrin of some, not nearly quickly enough for others. Who’s winning now? That’s difficult to say, but this struggle is a long way from decided.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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Social media exposes South Africa’s anti-social cricket culture

“CSA believe they have the privilege and prerogative to decide whether black lives matter.” – Omphile Ramela, SACA president

TELFORD VICE | Cape Town

CONTRASTING reactions to the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement have ripped the band-aid off the still gaping wound of racial disunity in South African cricket’s broader community. That follows Lungi Ngidi’s expressed support for BLM, and Graeme Smith’s suggestion that Cricket South Africa (CSA) will mark the tide rising globally against ongoing systemic racism towards blacks. Ngidi’s stance will be welcomed far and wide, but he has been chastised by former players from his own country on social media.

South Africa, which emerged from centuries of racial oppression 26 years ago, remains the most unequal society in the world with the white minority controlling a disproportionate amount of the country’s wealth. It will not escape notice that Ngidi is black and his detractors white, and that all of the latter owe their playing and subsequent careers in large part to the privilege afforded them by laws that advantaged those of their race.

And that they would likely not have had those careers had they been born black. Conversely, Ngidi would have been barred by law from fulfilling his talent had he been born in the country his critics grew up in. Those laws no longer exist, but their ongoing effects are impossible to explain away. Black lives did not matter in the old South Africa, and it is difficult to believe they matter currently.

None of which informed a Facebook thread on Wednesday that started with Rudi Steyn, who played three Tests and an ODI for South Africa during the 1990s, posting an article quoting Ngidi on BLM and commenting: “I believe the Proteas should make a stand against racism, but if they stand up for [BLM] while ignoring the way white farmers are daily being ‘slaughtered’ (sic) like animals, they have lost my vote.”

Boeta Dippenaar supported Steyn: “If you want me to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with you, Lungi, then stand shoulder-to-shoulder with me with regards to farm attacks.”

Former international umpire Ian Howell was on the same page: “Agree with you Rudi: all lives matter. [Ngidi] is entitled to his opinion but he should not be in a position to force it on his teammates.”

Brian McMillan wrote: “Opinions always accepted. But [Ngidi’s] current one, in my opinion, is crap and political! All lives matter!”

Pat Symcox weighed in with: “What nonsense is this. [Ngidi] must take his own stand if he wishes. Stop trying to get the Proteas involved in his belief … Now when Ngidi has his next meal perhaps he would rather consider supporting the farmers of South Africa who are under pressure right now. A cause worth supporting.”

Vince van der Bijl, a former fast bowler who served as the ICC’s umpires’ and referees’ manager, was a rare white voice arguing the other way: “BLM does not say other lives don’t matter … Respect is allowing others to have their opinions. You are allowed yours. We do not have the space to state all the things that we talk about. And agree on. Saying one thing does not exclude other beliefs. We ache for so many things in this country. Hopefully we can help the healing as opposed to widen the divides.”

According to the UN, South Africa has the ninth-highest murder rate in the world. Government statistics say 21,022 people were murdered in the country from April 2018 to March 2019. Only 57 of all those who suffered that fate in South Africa in 2019 were farmers. Many wealthier farmers are white, and the conspiracy theory that they are being wantonly attacked is widely spread by global far-right and neo-fascist political groups who propagate the myth an international “white genocide” is underway.

“Black Lives Matter. It is as simple as that.” – Jacques Faul, CSA acting chief executive

Dippenaar told Cricbuzz he took issue with the way BLM presented itself: “It’s got all the characteristics of a leftist movement — ‘If you don’t agree with what I propose you do, then you’re a racist’. The movement itself has gone beyond what it stands for. It’s now nothing short of thuggery — ‘I throw stones and break windows because I stand for this’.”

Most reports of violence at BLM protests have been shown to be untrue. More often protestors have been attacked by police, often without due cause.

Asked if he agreed that whites of his generation had benefitted unfairly from apartheid, Dippenaar said: “Of course we did. There is no doubt that it was a repressive, repulsive institution. And that it left us with a lot of scars. Things that happened during apartheid haven’t changed overnight, but as long as we use the excuse of apartheid we’ll never move forward. It’s a bit like being a drunk — he can only help himself the day he realises he’s an alcoholic.”

The spark for all that was Ngidi’s answer when he was asked, during an online press conference on Monday, whether South Africa’s players had or would talk about supporting BLM. “That’s definitely something that we will discuss once we are together in person,” Ngidi said. “We have spoken about it and everyone is well aware of what’s going on. It’s a difficult one because we are not together, so it’s hard to discuss. But once we get back to playing that is definitely something we have to address as a team.

Even though he clearly spoke in his personal capacity, Dippenaar regarded his comments as prescriptive: “The thing that’s wrong is Lungi Ngidi saying that CSA, as if he is speaking on behalf of everybody, should take a stand.”

At another online presser on Wednesday, director of cricket Smith did not give a direct answer when he was asked to clarify CSA’s stance on BLM: “We are very aware of what’s going on around the world and of our role at CSA. Lungi answered it very well when he said we are all in our own little pockets, and I think it’s important that in the future we all come together and figure out how we can play our role in the BLM movement; how we can be effective in doing that.

“My belief in these things is that it’s important to have buy-in and that of everyone invested in it as well, and I have no doubt that will be the case. But the discussion in each team environment and as CSA about how we handle it going forward is important.

“We do have the 3TC [a game in a new format] approaching on Mandela Day [July 18], where we are doing a lot for charity, and that will be our first occasion with the BLM movement. But as far as our iconic men’s and women’s teams are concerned there needs to be discussion.

“We’re discussing various ways of handling it. The kit has gone to print already. We need to figure out how we can be effective about it as well, also authentic, and spread the messages that are meaningful to us as South Africans. And how that affects us on a daily basis.”

That has been interpreted as unacceptable vacillation, not least by South African Cricketers’ Association president Omphile Ramela, who hit back in his personal capacity in a Facebook post on Thursday: “The fact that CSA is ‘pondering and seeking buy-in’ about how best to partake in the [BLM] movement is shameful! They believe they have the privilege and prerogative to decide whether black lives matter. Well, here is an answer to their ponder … Black lives do matter as stipulated by the law and transformation policies. It is a just, human, and lawful matter which requires no pondering nor buy-in from anybody.”

Ramela accused CSA of “regressing the gains of transformation in senior administrative representation and on the field of play”, a reference to the appointment of several whites — including Smith — in high profile positions in December, and to the fact that of the 176 places available in the XIs picked for the 16 matches South Africa’s men’s team have played since then, only 80 went to black and brown players. CSA’s transformation targets say at least six players in every team should not be white: two black and four brown. The teams picked since December thus fall short by 16 black and brown player places.

Ramela called for introspection: “Nobody is to be spared, starting with the white leaders across the entire cricket fraternity from the sponsors to the executives of unions and the mother body. Until these individual leaders collectively demonstrate contrition and consciously build a more inclusive future for the game, rather than preserving ill-gotten white privilege, they have no right to speak a word towards a global movement that has been sparked by the most grotesque incident [in Minneapolis on May 25, when the black George Floyd was killed in full public view by a white police officer].

“What the BLM movement is calling for, especially in the business of sport, is for the black and white members of the sport fraternity to start holding accountable those we entrust with the power to lead and preserve the integrity of the game,” Ramela wrote. “Sport continues to be a microcosm of society, yet it remains one of the most forceful tools we have to break the shackles and bondages of the past.”

That, as social media luridly laid bare on Thursday, is a long way off. Ngidi should be admired and respected for using his platform as a prominent player to become an activist in the cause for long denied justice that has, rightfully, won millions of followers of all races worldwide. But, for some, he has done the wrong thing. You have to wonder what those who feel that way made of Ngidi’s franchise, the Titans, issuing a release on Thursday to “add their voice and unwavering support to the [BLM] movement, as well as reiterating their unwavering intolerance of gender based violence”.

CSA, in particular, need to tread carefully. Having wasted one opportunity to put themselves on the right side of history, they can’t afford to stumble again. Nothing less than a strongly expressed anti-racist stance — non-racism is a cop-out — will suffice. A release on Thursday, which arrived long after all of the above had been spewed out, showed a shift in approach.

“CSA stands in solidarity with the BLM movement,” it began. “CSA was founded on the principles of non-racialism and inclusion at unity. The vision of CSA, to become a truly national sport of winners supported by the majority, finds resonance in the ethos of ‘Black Lives Matter’.”

The acting chief executive, Jacques Faul, was quoted as saying: “Black Lives Matter. It is as simple as that. As a national sporting body representing more than 56-million South Africans and with the privileged position of owning a platform as large as we do, it is of vital importance that we use our voice to educate and listen to others on topics involving all forms of discrimination.

“During our celebrations of Nelson Mandela International Day on 18 July, CSA will further spread the message of anti-racism through the BLM campaign while we also speak out against all forms of violence and in particular, the scourge that is gender based violence and various other causes that are of importance to our society and the organisation.”

From non-racism to anti-racism. From not saying enough themselves — or not saying it clearly enough — to listening to others. From a rotten past to a difficult present, but striving for a better future. Keep at it, CSA. The world is watching.

First published by Cricbuzz.

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And they’re back: Boucher, Kallis all grown up

“Dean Elgar won’t come out batting right-handed, or anything like that.” – Jacques Kallis assures South Africans that not everything about cricket has changed.

TELFORD VICE in Cape Town

MARK Boucher and Jacques Kallis. For all but 19 of the 156 men’s Tests South Africa played from October 1997 to March 2012, there was no separating them: behind the stumps, Boucher; at second slip, Kallis. They batted together 33 times and shared 1,157 runs, among them two century stands. They felt South Africa’s pain together at the 1999, 2003 and 2007 editions of the World Cup.

Where one went the other was sure to follow, on and off the field. Sometimes they seemed to be two halves of the same person. Boucher had enough brashness for the both of them. Kallis’ sheer stature seemed to add a foot to Boucher’s height. Boucher did almost all of the talking, Kallis almost all of the listening. At least, that’s how it looked from outside their bubble.

The partnership was broken, on the field, at Taunton on July 9, 2012, when a bail tumbled into Boucher’s left eye, ending his playing career. Off the field, the bond was seamless. They lived close to each other. They produced a brand of wine together. They were bestmen at each other’s weddings.

And, as of Wednesday, they are back in South Africa’s dressingroom. Boucher’s appointment as coach and Kallis’ acquisition, for the summer, as the batting consultant are the biggest pieces in the puzzle Graeme Smith is trying to solve since his own enlistment as acting director of cricket last Saturday. With those three giants has come some of the belief that has been seeping out of South Africa’s cause since Smith’s retirement in March 2014. Add Charl Langeveldt as the bowling consultant — he has had a previous and successful coaching stint with the team — and there are reasons to be cheerful that rise above even Cricket South Africa’s (CSA) shambolic administration.

Or are there? The jury in the court of public opinion would seem to be out. In captioning a photograph of Boucher, Kallis and Langeveldt on social media, Boeta Dippenaar connected the dots to the ills of South Africa’s wider society: “Are these gentlemen the answer to CSA’s problems? The short answer is no. Why? Because years of neglect got us to where we are today. A systematic breakdown of structures is the root cause. It’s politics, it’s about ‘me’ and not the game. CSA is a reflection of what we see happening at SOE’s [state owned enterprises] and most local municipalities. The appointment of the three gentlemen represents a small step in the right direction. That brought Vince van der Bijl into the conversation: “African proverb … How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. We have started the meal.” Soon Barry Richards was at it: “Cricket sense from a cricketer. Right direction of course. But the elephant is still in the room.”

The elephant is CSA and its gift for losing money and stumbling down dark alleys in governance terms. At board level, that is — the appointment of the respected Jacques Faul as acting chief executive, to replace Thabang Moroe, who has been suspended, elicited almost audible sighs of relief. Moroe’s removal was required to get Smith aboard, and here we are a week later with a newly minted coaching staff and rather more than we previously had of the precious metal Dippenaar referenced to end his post: “#hope”. But there are no honeymoons after shotgun marriages, and South Africa’s new regime will hit the ground running in a Test series against England that starts at Centurion on Thursday.

“Two weeks ago I thought I was going to be in St Francis [a resort on South Africa’s east coast] over Christmas, maybe take a little trip to Fancourt for some golf,” Boucher told reporters in Centurion on Friday, where South Africa’s camp was in full swing with him directing operations. “Things have changed …” Things like the people in top jobs: “I had faith that the guys who had been put in those leadership positions would be able to take care of certain things and I would be able to focus on this job and try to take this group of players forward.”

Something else that would seem to have changed is that Kallis isn’t letting Boucher do all of the talking anymore: “Jacques mentioned in the changeroom the other day about preparing for an exam. If you go into an exam and you don’t feel prepared, you are not going to have the confidence. That’s what we are trying to do — get the guys’ confidence back and make sure we have ticked every box possible, so that when they do get into the Test match they feel they are ready.”

While Boucher is calculating and canny, Kallis is as close to instinct on legs as it is possible to be for someone steeped in the complexities of cricket. He thinks, but he doesn’t let thought get in the way of action. “I’m just trying to get to know the individuals,” Kallis said. “‘Bouch’ and Enoch [Nkwe, the assistant coach] have worked with a lot of the guys so they know them pretty well. I’m trying to get a relationship with the players and see how they are thinking and trying to give them game plans. I’m not a big one for changing too many things. Dean Elgar won’t come out batting right-handed, or anything like that. I’m just trying to give the guys options and ideas and make them realise you can’t bat the same way every time you walk out to bat. You have to adapt your game. I’m trying to get them to know their game plan a lot better so they can try and adapt while they are batting. It’s not the spoonfeeding of coaching; it’s trying to educate them so they can educate themselves while they are out in the middle. It’s a lot of off-the-field stuff, the mind stuff, along with the technical stuff.”

Kallis has come a long way since his playing days, when you could look into his eyes and see not a flicker of life if he wasn’t interested in what was going on around him. Boucher, too, has become a proper human being compared to the time when his primary ambition was to, he used to say, “walk onto the field as if you own the place”. Losing half his sight may have helped make him see things more accurately, or at least in a light favourable for more positive, less competitive interaction with his world. “I’ve learnt a lot of lessons along the way,” Boucher said. “I learnt that my way is not always the right way. There were times in my career where I used to go out there and be quite aggressive and try and impose myself on teammates. This is what I have learnt on diversity within a set-up. Sometimes you won’t get the best out of the players if you are trying to get them to be like you. My biggest lesson is to let people be who they are and let them be natural. I played at my best when I was natural but my natural wasn’t the same as AB’s [De Villiers] natural or Jacques’ natural. That’s a big lesson I have learnt with regards to leading individuals. Whenever I make a decision, I ask myself, ‘Is it a good cricketing decision?’. And if I can answer yes, then I go with it and I tap into other knowledge in the dressingroom to back that up. And then we go full steam ahead with that. The last thing you want to do is second-guess yourself.”

Some things don’t change. Boucher is still a hard bastard. Kallis is still a colossus who owns any room he steps into. Other things do change: they’ve learnt how to be themselves better. For the rest of us, that’s called growing up. For people like Boucher and Kallis, who aren’t allowed the time and space to mature naturally, it’s called success. If they can get that into their charges’ heads, nothing will stop South Africa.

First published by Cricbuzz.

Striking players back for Zim tour of SA

TMG Digital

TELFORD VICE in London

LIKE everything in Zimbabwe, cricket strays as far from trouble as a leopard does from its spots.

But the team that should be thrown out of the world game for representing a despotic regime had something to celebrate on Thursday.

Brendan Taylor, Sean Williams and Craig Ervine were named in the squad to play three one-day internationals in South Africa starting at the end of the month. Taylor and Williams are also in the mix for the three T20s that will follow.

Taylor and Williams last played for Zimbabwe in March and Ervine in May. They have cited unpaid salaries for their decision to, effectively, go on strike.

In June the relationship between Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) and their players became strained enough for the suits to appoint the straightest talker in cricket, Vince van der Bijl, as a consultant.

“It will be a tough road for ZC but so worthwhile for all involved — hopefully with the support and investment of all around the game from individuals, players, and all the way to the International Cricket Council and government, ZC and the cricket-lovers in Zimbabwe can turn this around to former glory,” Van der Bijl said at the time. “What a thing that will be.”

But even his powers of persuasion didn’t get Taylor, Williams and Ervine back into Zimbabwe shirts.

In July they missed a home T20 triangular against Australia and Pakistan and five ODIs in Pakistan.

Zimbabwe lost all nine of those matches, and if they have any chance of putting up a credible performance in South Africa they will need the skill and experience of the three returning players.

It’s a measure of just how far Zimbabwe have dwindled from the plucky side they once were that, even with Taylor, Williams and Ervine in harness, they lost to the United Arab Emirates in the World Cup qualifiers in March.

But Williams top-scored with a run-a-ball 80 and, in Zimbabwe’s previous game — another loss against West Indies three days earlier — Taylor made 138.

Sikandar Raza also wasn’t picked for the South Africa tour, presumably because ZC are still grumpy with him for playing club cricket in England without first securing a no-objection certificate.

Graeme Cremer is recovering from knee surgery, but he and Raza have also been at loggerheads with ZC in recent months.

The International Cricket Council have done their bit to negotiate a truce between the administrators and the players by implementing a structured funding plan; essentially imposing debt-counselling for a board mired in chronic financial mismanagement.

Lalchand Rajput, who played two Tests and four ODIs for India in the 1980s, will undertake his first series as Zimbabwe’s coach since his appointment in August.

What has he got himself into?

Zimbabwe squads:

ODI: Hamilton Masakadza (captain), Solomon Mire, Craig Ervine, Brendan Taylor, Sean Williams, Peter Moor, Elton Chigumbura, Donald Tiripano, Kyle Jarvis, Brandon Mavuta, Richard Ngarava, Tinashe Kamunhukamwe, Wellington Masakadza, Ryan Murray, Tendai Chatara.

T20: Hamilton Masakadza (captain), Solomon Mire, Neville Madziva, Brendan Taylor, Sean Williams, Peter Moor, Elton Chigumbura, Tendai Chisoro, Kyle Jarvis, Brandon Mavuta, Christopher Mpofu, Chamu Chibhabha, Wellington Masakadza, Tarisai Musakanda, Tendai Chatara.

Brace yourselves, ZC: Vince is a zealot

“How can you turn your back when you are asked to assist?” – Vince van der Bijl

Sunday Times

TELFORD VICE in Lisbon

VINCE van der Bijl is the most upright man in cricket, a properly conscious figure in a sport that too often struggles to do the right thing.

So why has he signed up as a consultant for the chronically uncredible Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC), which crashes from doing one wrong thing through a string of others?

“I believe sport changes and energizes people, even societies,” Van der Bijl replied. “As Mandela said, sport reaches people in a way that politicians cannot.

“Anyone who has been to Zimbabwe will know how easy it is to be enchanted with the character and friendliness of its people and see the magnificence and amazing potential of this country. That combination needs to be nurtured in every way possible even though cricket there has been through such a difficult time.

“How can you turn your back when you are asked to assist? It is a privilege to try and help.

“Cricket has a rich cricket heritage here and that is something the cricket world should savour and refresh.

“The sports project I am involved in, in Masiphumelele, an impoverished township in Cape Town near Kommetjie, has taught me what is possible. Sport genuinely changes lives.

“Naturally, as a consultant, I really hope I can make a difference. It will not be for want of trying.

“The World Cup qualifiers, so successfully run in Harare this year, revealed the passion the fans, players, administration and everyone involved in staging this event have for cricket and that they have that deep desire to make the difference. That is what makes the future of the game in Zimbabwe sustainable.”

That’s the third version of Van der Bijl’s answer. Twice he came back to build on the original, both times well outside of business hours.

Van der Bijl thinks in his sleep, does what he says he will do, and is afraid of nothing and no-one.

Not only do ZC have a man of cricket on their hands, they have a zealot. The gods help them.