Two straight shooters tasked with restoring wilting Proteas

If straight-talking was one criteria Cricket SA was seeking from the pair of new coaches who will be in charge of the Proteas, in Shukri Conrad and Rob Walter that is what they are getting. 

The players — those currently part of the different squads and those who will be selected — and Cricket SA, which too often tiptoes around what has gone wrong with the national team, have been put on notice. 

“Shukri, like Rob, was very firm. They don’t sugar-coat issues and that is what’s needed right now. There’s been too much sugar-coating around what has gone wrong with the Proteas,” said recently retired cricketer Farhaan Behardien.

The former white-ball Protea player ended his professional career three weeks ago and worked with both Conrad, the Proteas’ new Test coach, and Walter, the team’s new limited-overs mentor, who was in charge of the Titans for three seasons from 2013. 

“He knows how and when to speak to players,” Behardien said of Walter. “In my case I didn’t mind being spoken to straight and I remember him ‘kakking me out’ after I’d played a shocking shot in a game at SuperSport Park. It was irresponsible and he reminded me of that fact afterwards and of my role in the team. There was no pussyfooting around with him.”

Behardien had been part of a successful Titans side that was starting to dominate the domestic game and had already made his international debut in both limited-overs formats for the Proteas when Walter delivered his no-holds-barred assessment. “That chat changed my career path,” he said. 

Behardien played 97 matches for the Proteas and was a prominent part in that era of dominance the Titans enjoyed under successive coaches, starting with Richard Pybus, Matthew Maynard, then Walter and later Mark Boucher. 

“We didn’t win a trophy in our first year, got one in the second year and then did the double in his third year, which is when we really reaped the benefits of Rob’s work,” Behardien said. 

If Walter can follow a similar path with the national side, Cricket SA will be delighted. He and Conrad will take up four-year contracts from February 1 with the goals for both being to win trophies — Conrad the World Test Championship and Walter the 2027 World Cup, which will be hosted in SA. 

While Conrad, whose playing career coincided with the unification of the sport in the late 1980s and early 1990s, has worked within Cricket SA’s system on a consistent basis in the past 20 years, Walter had taken a different path. 

He came to prominence as the Proteas’ fitness and conditioning coach under Gary Kirsten and left that role to become the Titans head coach, an appointment that shocked many in cricket circles. However, Berhardien recalled, “we didn’t really think about it [Walter not having head coaching experience].

“We had a strong core of senior players — Heino Kuhn, Albie Morkel and Pierre Joubert among others. It was a different approach, but under [CEO] Jacques Faul, the Titans were always looking for that. Rob was given the freedom to build how he wanted to build, with the players he wanted to bring in.”

Walter, Berhardien explained, placed a premium on strategy, skills, fitness and fielding. “As a player, you were aware that no stone was left unturned.”

“He believed in the shared experience; team bonding played a big role in his style. He learnt a lot from Gary Kirsten after working under him and brought some of that to the Titans.” 

Walter spent the last seven years coaching in New Zealand, first with the Otago Volts and most recently with the Central Districts Stags, a role he will continue in until the conclusion of the two domestic limited-overs competitions in New Zealand in February. Central Districts are top of the log in both tournaments.

“He would have evolved his coaching style in New Zealand,” Behardien said. 

He highlighted the challenges facing the two coaches as they seek to restore pride to the Proteas brand, which has taken a battering in recent months.

“The situation with the Proteas goes a lot deeper than a new coach coming in can resolve. There’s the financial situation at Cricket SA, the number of matches being played and selection, among other things. It’s extremely tough.”

Does Behardien think his former franchise coach can meet the mandate in 2027? “Everyone who has been in that [head coaching] position has tried and failed so far, so the proof is in the pudding.”