South Africa

...the ICC has concluded that the racist abuse from Australian fans towards South Africa's cricketers was "premeditated, coordinated and calculated to get under the players' skins". Here are the key finding of the report (Reuters) :

I find that racial abuse of South African players has taken place during their tour of Australia," ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed quoted the report as saying on Tuesday."Herschelle Gibbs, Shaun Pollock, Andre Nel and Boeta Dippenaar were all subjected to racial abuse in different places. "It would be wrong to attribute racial abuse to South African expatriates living in Australia. It was premeditated, coordinated and calculated to get after the players. It is a serious matter," he told a news conference.

 

"It is the first complaint made by a cricketing nation and it must be taken very seriously. The chief executives of the Australia and South Africa boards and I will come back with recommendations for a change, if any, to the ICC anti-racism policy during the April 30 meeting," Speed said after a meeting of the ICC board.

 

Now I don't want to crow too much, but to all those Aussies who sent me mail (after this post) about how I was "well off the mark" or "misjudging the Australian sports mentality", because "hell it is obvious that these fools were South African expats" - all I can say is read the ICC report for yourself! 

I love it :

Olympic champions South Africa held off a concerted final leg challenge to end Australia's unbeaten Games record with a thrilling men's 4x100m freestyle relay victory at the Commonwealth Games on Thursday. The South African team of Roland Schoeman, Lyndon Ferns, Gerhard Zandberg and Ryk Neethling swept to a Games record of three minutes 14.97 seconds to edge out Australia and Canada for gold. It was Australia's first defeat in the 100m freestyle relay since the 1978 Edmonton Games.

 

Who's your daddy?

                                    Greatest. Game. Ever.

Update : For those expats who didn't manage to catch the game you can download the game highlights here (warning it is 6GB). Two great stories from Cricinfo about the actual game and the mood the day after. 

I think not! The headline of the story reads Proteas humiliate the Aussies, and what a fine story it is indeed. When I read that headline I lay back in my chair and savoured what I was reading, it was better than any fine wine or beer after a hard days work. Proteas humiliate the Aussies. Mmm, yes I'll take a side order of that and anything I don't finish now I'd like put in a doggy bag so I can finish it at home! So how bad was the humiliation :  

"Makhaya Ntini took the best figures by a South African in one-day international cricket as South Africa crushed Australia by 196 runs in the second one-day international at Newlands Friday. The win put South Africa 2-0 up in a five-match series. Ntini took four wickets in a devastating opening spell and finished with six for 22 as Australia were bowled out for 93, their fourth-lowest all-time total." (NEWS24)

Best figures. Second highest total. 2-0. Bowled out for 93. A crushing win of 196 runs. My cup runnneth over.

Makhaya Ntini for President! For those of you who feel the need to do a bit of crowing over this famous day, I would suggest you head over to John's Cricket-Blog (great blog by the way, was a nice read during our tour down under) and register your commiserations. 

          Proudly South African!

I wanted to comment on this earlier but never got round to it, so here it is -- Roland, we need more people like you! You are truly an inspiration to the rest of us with your fierce patriotism and dedication to our country. I really enjoyed reading your piece in the Sunday Times because too seldom these days do we hear sentiments of pride being expressed about our country:

The proudest moment in my life was standing on the podium with my relay teammates at the 2004 Athens Olympics, seeing the South African flag hoisted high and listening to Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika.

 

I cannot describe the emotions that went through me that day.

 

At the world championships this year, I became the first man in the world to swim a sub-23 second 50m butterfly. I’m also only a whisker away from breaking the 50m freestyle record, and I’m trying as hard as dammit to do the same in the 100m freestyle. But I can tell you now that feelings of personal achievement don’t quite match the emotions of achieving something for your country.

 

Great stuff! Unfortunately, it seems South Africa hasn't been as proud or supportive of Schoeman as he has been of South Africa :

However, I have to admit I was very disappointed when I came back to South Africa after the world championships and couldn’t increase my sponsorships. I was euphoric about my achievements and I was certain I would be successful in extending my sponsorship base in my home country. It became clear to me that, apart from my existing sponsors who have been very supportive of me and for which I am extremely grateful, there were no other organisations at the time that were queuing up to sponsor me.

 

It could be that I have been extremely bad at selecting an agent able to obtain extra sponsorship for me. But it became so bad that my agent could not even secure a cellphone for me — just a cellphone, not even a contract or prepaid. Just the handset!

 

I left South Africa feeling dejected and disheartened.

 

This is totally unacceptable and needs to change immediately; we can't let such a fine South African be left in a lurch like this. I was very heartened to read last week of a South African expat living in Canada who pledged R250 000 in sponsorship for Schoeman for next year (respect Dr. Sieg Heydenrych). This is more than admirable, but at the end of the day it is the Corporates who need to step up to the plate and put their money where their mouths are (yes I'm talking about all of you "Proudly South Africa" Co.'s). 

The editorial of the Sunday Times sums it up nicely when it says :

But it seems that too few locals truly appreciate his worth. SA owes Schoeman a lot more than a thank you.

 

You're damn right!

Checkout Roland's site here

Great game and great win!

THEY said it could get ugly, but seldom has such a romantic result been achieved with such pragmatism.It was not the running rugby of old that brought the Cheetahs the greatest upset in modern South African rugby. Instead, they played a pared-down game and were uncannily able to upset the usually unflappable Bulls.

 

The road to the Cheetahs’ first Currie Cup title since their only win in 1976 was paved not with double skip-passes and moves using the width of the field, but the blood and sweat of their forward pack, and flyhalf Willem de Waal’s unerring boot...(read more here)

Let's get the ball rolling with a bit of good news. Well done to Jacques Kallis who was named as the International Cricket Council's (ICC) Test Player of the Year. The award wasn't even a close race, as News24 reports :

"Kallis was a runaway winner of one of the sport's top individual awards, polling almost three times as many votes as the runner-up, Australia fast bowler Glenn McGrath. Kallis played 15 Tests in the 12-month voting period which ended on July 31 this year. He scored 1 497 runs in that time, easily the most by any batsman in the world, at an average of 71.28 including six centuries. Kallis took 20 wickets and also held 16 catches."

Well done Jacques! 

England showed they had what it takes and brought home the Ashes, with a draw two days ago. It was a great series that kept me on the edge of my seat the entire time - nothing like a good game of Test Cricket. In case you are worried the Poms might get big heads over this all, lets turn to the UK Press to put it all in perspective :

"A glorious end to England's summer" - Daily Telegraph

"Cricket's coming home" - The Times

"After 16 years, a phoenix takes wing from the Ashes of defeatism." - The Times

And to think all it took was a South African batsman and Zimbabwean coach! (okay before I get deluged with hate-mail from the UK my tongue is firmly wedged in my cheek)

This is unacceptable and deserves an official Inquiry. Forget for a moment the fact that we are the 2010 hosts and should be making our mark in World soccer, instead lets look at exactly who beat us last week (convincingly at that). Burkina Faso is a country with a population a third of our own, they have never qualified for the World Cup and (apart for a fourth place in 1998) they have never advanced beyond the first round of African Nations Cup. Go figure.

However, to blame everything on one loss is to be disengenuos, rather lets be honest - we've been getting progressively worse since our triumph in 1996. -

African Nations Cup record

1994 - Did not qualify
1996 - Champions
1998 - Second place
2000 - Third place
2002 - Quarterfinals
2004 - Round 1

 

Instead of getting solutions to the problem we are provided with a whole bunch of spin by SAFA, the Ministry of Sport and the players. This farce has got to stop. What gets to me even more is while the Springbok Rugby is close to the top of world rugby, Sports Minister Makhenkesi Stofile is engaged in a personal spat with SA Rugby boss Brian van Rooyen. He even went so far as to call for a judicial commission of inquiry into allegations of maladministration in Rugby. Where the hell are the priorities? Our soccer is collapsing and we have just been humiliated in front of the rest of the soccer world and our Sports Minister is out settling a personal score? I don't think I have read one word of reaction from Stofile on this debacle..

Yeah lets have an inquiry - into soccer!

Very sad article about the terrible financial state of SA cricket. Seems the corporate sector and government are not the only places for fat cats to play - sports administration has become fair game as well. These pigs have their snouts firmly stuck in the trough :

"the board’s former finance director, Diteko Modise, is on trial for allegedly embezzling R7,25-million. The UCB’s salary bill last year may have been more than R8,5-million, but it is hard to believe Modise’s luxury vehicles and a R2,5-million house bought for cash on the Dainfern Estate failed to raise eyebrows.

The controls on the UCB’s purse strings were as loose as Paul Adams’s bowling, and many financial irregularities occurred.

Modise was group chairperson of Meloko Investment Holdings and one of its subsidiaries, of which UCB chief executive Gerald Majola, also a director and shareholder, was awarded a R3-million contract to upgrade the in-house computer network. The UCB’s policy is that all contracts of more than R100 000 must go out to public tender."

 

This is my "favourite" piece of the article :

"Other oddities are the donation, via a UCB cheque, of R6 000 by a senior administrator to his son’s school, and the reprinting of the 2005 incoming tours brochure at an extra cost of R155 000. A copy sat around at the UCB offices for proofreading for 10 days before deadline, but 20 000 copies were printed before Majola finally responded and changed one photograph and one line of text about the new franchise system.

The photograph was of the legendary Basil D’Oliveira standing next to Ali Bacher, Majola’s predecessor as CEO. The new picture did not have Bacher in it."

 

Fantastic! Keep up the good work guys and don't forget to apportion those massive salaries to yourselves for such sterling work....