KEVIN MCCALLUM: Double Dutch SA cricket has gone beyond patching things up with double talk

Two media releases were issued by Cricket SA this week after the Proteas had been marched out of the T20 World Cup in double-quick time by the doable Dutch. The first, under the banner of “Media Release” was headlined “CSA saddened by Proteas T20 World Cup early exit”. The next one was an interview with Sune Luus, but was posted directly below the “saddened” Cricket SA missive with the banner “The Humbled Forum”.

Humbled, bumbled and rumbled — the story of SA at world cups. That it came at the hands of the Netherlands on an early morning in Adelaide may make it the most galling of all of SA’s exits. This was no rain-affected confusion, no swashbuckling rush, no muddled run-out nor a selection mess and a monster six from an SA ex-pat. This was being rolled over by the Netherlands, a team that sit at 17 in the T20I rankings, just below Nepal. 

It was, as Temba Bavuma, said upon his return to SA, “... to exit like that begs a lot of questioning”. 

Fear not, SA, for Cricket SA is on the case, as CEO Pholetsi Moseki was quoted in the “saddened” release: “It is evidently hard for all of us to be faced with this disappointment. However, our focus should be rebuilding the team for future success. Lessons learnt from this experience will be inculcated into strategies to redeem from the weaknesses and build a formidable attack in future.” 

That last sentence is double talk, garbled corporate speak, a mix of sense and gobbledegook. It says nothing and deliberately so. To say something would be to acknowledge the sense of uncertainty that prevails in SA cricket circles. From the players to the administrators, fear stalks the boards and dressing rooms. Nothing seems settled, nothing concrete or assured.

Things seem just a thin edge away from a crisis. Perhaps I’m being overly naive. Perhaps that is the way of sport and unions around the world. Loads of small fish in a small pond fighting for their piece and place, some caring more than others, others just caring for themselves. It just feels worsened in SA cricket and down the years I have spoken to and dealt with many SA administrators and players who confirm that it is simply so. 

Sometimes you just wish there would be a steady hand, an assured voice to tighten up our pads and tell us it will be all right. Sometimes I wish we had the likes of Ali Bacher and Krish Mackerdhuj to remind us what it took to get here and what it is supposed to mean. 

I am sure Moseki meant well, even if his quote meant nothing at all. Moseki seems a decent man, parachuted into a position that has become poisonous and no place for the faint-hearted. But, man, after a loss to the Dutch, sometimes you need to speak so that you don’t sound like you are singing a song to Double Dutch, the skipping game.

You know the game — two ropes, one skipper, spectators singing, clapping to a set rhythm. Malcolm McLaren, he of Sex Pistols fame, came to SA in the early 1980s, ripped off a song called Puleng by The Boyoyo Boys and turned it into Double Dutch, which would go on to reach No 3 on the UK charts. The Boyoyo Boys apparently never saw a cent of royalties. But, I digress. 

SA cricket has had too much spinning of the harsh realities facing it. It’s beyond time for straight talking, to go beyond double talk. Mark Boucher knows the pain of being knocked out of world cups. He also knows that for a lot of players, representing their country is no longer the pinnacle of their careers.

There’s gold in them there T20 leagues, lots and lots of it. It doesn’t come with long tours, interfering administrators and merely OK money. It just, well, seems easier.

 “We’ll just have to try to keep all the players interested in playing for SA,” said Boucher after the loss to the Netherlands. “I think that’s ... that’s a big question that needs to be answered. And then hopefully, hopefully, they can put some good combinations together and create good coaching stuff around these guys.” 

Hope. SA has it in spades before every world cup. They need more than that. They need less double talk, less Double Dutch, less humbling and bumbling. As Bavuma and Boucher said this week, there are questions that need to be asked. Whether we will see any answers that make sense instead of gobbledegook is one too.