Poor show does not affect Proteas’ World Cup chances

Even if Australia win the third ODI in Potchefstroom on Tuesday and clinch the series to go with their T20I success, it should not, theoretically, make any difference to the Proteas’ World Cup campaign. Australia, on the other hand, would be justified in believing it gives theirs a boost.

It may sound obvious but pretty much everything about a World Cup is different from a bilateral series. The Proteas need only look at their own history to see how they have dominated opposition in three, five and even seven-match series before stumbling in multiteam tournaments.

There is a reasonable chance that Temba Bavuma’s team will prevail at Centurion or the Wanderers to avoid a whitewash but will that make any difference to the prevailing mood in the squad? Perhaps. But there just might be fissures within the group that have nothing to do with the results.

The most obvious one is the impending fixture clash between the SA20 in 2024 and two matches in the World Test Championship in New Zealand. The issue should not, and probably does not, affect the players when they take the field against Australia where they are focusing solely on bat and ball but, like a bruise or scab, it is a constant irritation between fixtures.

Cricket SA was provided with the dates for the SA20 on March 8 2023. They were January 10 to February 10. The proposed dates for the New Zealand Tests had already been received from New Zealand Cricket. February 4-17, with a warm-up match from January 29-31. Cricket SA accepted the Test schedule.

Aware that Cricket SA’s contract with the SA20 guarantees the availability of all of the country’s best players for the duration of the tournament, and keen not to breach that contract, Cricket SA CEO Pholetsi Moseki swiftly issued a statement confirming that players with SA20 contracts would be unavailable for the Test series. But that left Cricket SA in breach of another contract. Their own, with their own players.

The nationally contracted Proteas are legally bound to be available for all bilateral cricket. So, in effect, Cricket SA ordered its own players to break their contract with ... Cricket SA. To put things in even bleaker perspective, even if Test captain Temba Bavuma were to negotiate a release from his contract with Sunrisers Eastern Cape to lead the team in New Zealand, Cricket SA would probably veto his selection to protect the “primacy” of the SA20.

Cricket SA’s contract with the SA20 also stipulates that Cricket SA cannot schedule any bilateral, international cricket for the duration of the tournament. Another breach.

Many players with SA20 contracts who would, or might, have been in contention for selection on the New Zealand tour, will be adversely affected financially. Those in the lowest auction bracket of R175,000 (Kyle Verreynne and Sarel Erwee, for example) could point to the New Zealand tour fee of about R250,000 and ask a question about compensation.

Further afield, there is the agreement that Cricket SA (and every other nation) signed with the ICC. The first regulation in the sanctioning of international cricket states: “International cricket must be given primacy and promoted above all else, because it remains the main showcase of the sport, the ultimate aspiration for young players joining the sport, and the main drive of the public interest and consequent commercial revenues that are the lifeblood of the sport”. It would be a challenge for Cricket SA to argue that they have ticked that box.

Meanwhile, SA’s Test coach, Shukri Conrad, has been busy scraping together a possible squad. He has been told the tour is going ahead and that is his job, after all.

The regular Test players, however, are furious. It is precisely because they are so angry that they have been so quiet on the subject. Though the landscape of national honours may change in the years to come, at the moment the Proteas Test cap remains indisputably the greatest form of recognition. The prospect of a dozen of them being handed out like party hats at New Year infuriates those who have earned them.

There are more than enough problems on the field without Rob Walter needing to worry about bristling off-field niggles. Every professional workforce functions more efficiently with faith and trust in management, but that dynamic is exaggerated in a workplace as fickle as sport in which contracts and careers can be cancelled or change direction after just a couple of bad days in the office.

Perhaps it’s not relevant. Heinrich Klaasen bats with a blunt instrument and talks with one, too. “Australia have played with far greater intensity than us and we just need to do the basics well to compete, and we haven’t done that,” he said on Monday. There are certainly distractions for this team “but there are no excuses”, Klaasen said with honesty as withering as it was refreshing.