Sunday Tribune

New T20 to hit SA game for six

- Clinton van der Berg On Twitter: Clintonv AUCKLAND

SOMETIMES with cricket it seems like you’re waking up in a parallel universe where everything is upside down and out of place.

Almost everything we knew and cherished has been prodded and poked, shifted aside or recalibrat­ed. It’s called progress and in roughly 10 years cricket has morphed from a staid, safe sport into a riot of action, gaudy sideshows and bags of cash.

Welcome to cricket, circa 2017, where the lights are lasers, the girls are pretty and contestant­s are master blasters (rather than cricketers) and soundbite merchants. Entertainm­ent oozes out of every pore, moments are sponsored and milestones are, well, fast forgotten.

After this week’s shindig in London, where South Africa’s T20 Global League was launched, this extravagan­t new world is on our doorstep. SA has officially joined the party, albeit at twilight hour with the Indian Premier League and others long establishe­d.

“We must safeguard the future,” said Chris Nenzani, Cricket SA president, without evident irony. Better late than never, eh. Just as well that SA’S superstars and the usual suspects – Chris Gayle, Dwayne Bravo and Kevin Pietersen – are coming to the party. This is no B-list bash. There are sexy team owners, iconic players, swanky venues and shades of Bollywood. Don King would be proud.

With the cost of franchises believed to range from $3m to $5m, it’s little surprise that just two of the eight team owners are from South Africa, among them the exotically named Osman Osman. An impresario who made his name with comedy and Bollywood shows across Africa, he brings a suitably grandiose presence to the game. He’s an entertainm­ent and lifestyle man who has ambitions of turning his Pretoria franchise into another glamorous arm of his business. The omens are good: AB de Villiers is his marquee man.

The other local owners are Brimstone Investment­s, a Cape-based investment consortium. The company has a long and successful record of excellence in the corporate world. They aren’t in this venture for the jolly. There’s money to be made. They will be cautious and careful in an environmen­t they are unfamiliar with, but it’s a marvellous coup for T20. If Brimstone sees the possibilit­ies, there must be a good thing brewing.

It signals new money moving into cricket and in a depressed economy like ours, this is no bad thing.

Quite how South Africans will respond is a mystery. The trouble with franchise sport is that teams typically have no history, no long-standing roots in the community, no tradition. The first trick is to generate a buzz and to reach out. Fans must be seduced by the promise of action and intrigue, as the IPL has demonstrat­ed.

If Indians have shown an insatiable appetite for the IPL, the same probably won’t be true here. How could it? Cricket in SA has its firm base, but it’s not fanatical or outlandish. The marketers will have to work hard.

There will be interestin­g spin-offs, mostly positive. For one, there will be big money to be made for local cricketers. The Global League will thus help stem the tide of talented locals shipping overseas, no bad thing.

Far more grand is the possibilit­y of top-level T20 instilling courage and audacity in our play. No-one doubts the well of talent that abounds across SA, but there is a soft underbelly to the way we play. Our failures at the top end are routine, probably because it’s more difficult to confront “soft” issues like tenacity and bloody-mindedness, or what the All Blacks call “mongrel”. For all our exceptiona­l talent, we haven’t found a way to hang tough.

Fearlessne­ss is a critical quality required to survive and thrive in T20. Perhaps it will subconscio­usly seep into our play. We shall see.

It will be curious to watch how SA’S establishe­d unions view the cocky new interloper. They can either embrace the new product and feed off its energy, or pretend it isn’t there and carry on with business as usual. T20 may not be for everyone, but it’s the future.

A brave new world awaits.

THE All Blacks may be known for champagne rugby but their forwards proved they can get “down and dirty” during their physical 30-15 victory over the British and Irish Lions in the first Test yesterday, coach Steve Hansen said.

The touring pack had been expected to provide the sternest examinatio­n of the world champions in the opening game of their three-match series, but Hansen’s tight five dominated the collisions, held the ball for long periods, and forced the Lions to make an enormous amount of tackles.

While Lions coach Warren Gatland observed that the All Blacks “didn’t come out and play champagne rugby,” Hansen said: “You don’t become the number one side in the world for as long as we have been without a very good tight five.

“I always find it amusing when everyone tells us they’re going to beat us up in the tight five. We’re not just a team that plays flashy rugby, we are a team that can get down and play ... dirty rugby and I mean down and dirty in the most respectful way,” he added after his side repelled a ferocious challenge from the visitors.

“If your tight five operate and do their job then everyone else can play. I think we won that battle but that doesn’t guarantee we will win that next week. We need to front up again.”

The world champions were superbly led by captain Kieran Read, who drew special praise from Hansen, but locks Brodie Retallick and Sam Whitelock and flanker Sam Cane were also heavily involved in nullifying the Lions’ forward threat.

The All Blacks’ ability to get over the gain line and behind the Lions close to the ruck also cancelled the threat of their suffocatin­g defensive screen out wide, which had been especially effective over the last 10 days.

“We felt that we could hurt them if we could get in there (behind the defensive line) and take away their line speed,” Hansen said. “I think it was more our ability to play off nine and get behind them that really hurt them and took away what they wanted to do.”

Hansen added that it had been a steady accumulati­on of pressure that was crucial.

“Once we started to look after the ball and stopped offloading, we built some pressure time after time.

“They had to make a lot of tackles and that fatigues you and that’s when you make mistakes. That was the critical part of the game.”

Meanwhile, Lions coach Warren Gatland thinks the series remains very much alive.

Popular wisdom had it that the Lions would have to catch the All Blacks cold yesterday if they were to have any chance of securing a first series win in New Zealand since 1971.

Gatland thought his team showed enough at Eden Park to give them a foundation to win the second Test in Wellington next week and return to Auckland for a decider in a fortnight, even if they left a couple of opportunit­ies on the pitch. “I felt we created some great chances, we played some lovely rugby and scored a couple of nice tries, which was hugely positive,” the New Zealander told a news conference. All Blacks vice-captain Ben Smith and centre Ryan Crotty are injury concerns for the rest of the series against the British and Irish Lions after they came off during the 30-15 victory in the first test at Eden Park yesterday.

Fullback Smith failed a head injury assessment during the first half, while Crotty limped off later in the spell with a hamstring injury and will

“It was a bit disappoint­ing that there were a couple of golden moments, great opportunit­ies to score, and then we just switched off for a moment.”

Gatland was less impressed with his team’s discipline, one lapse in concentrat­ion that led to the All Blacks’ first try, a couple of soft handling errors and most of all how the hosts dominated the tight five battle.

“For me those things are all fixable,” he said. “The All Blacks haven’t played champagne rugby and thrown the ball all over the place.

“In fairness to them, they were very direct up front and we need to be better at combating them in those areas.”

Gatland said the squad would head down to the New Zealand capital without any injury problems beyond “a couple of stingers”, which was definitely miss next week’s Test in Wellington, coach Steve Hansen said.

Hansen said earlier yesterday that hooker Dane Coles had been ruled out of the series due to fitness issues after he had been unable to train since March with knee and calf injuries and then concussion symptoms.

Gatland said the Lions were without any injury problems. They play the Hurricanes on Tuesday before the second Test next Saturday. – Reuters good news given the test in the tight that New Zealand presented yesterday.

“We’ve got to be much more physical next week because they came with a very physical approach tonight and were very direct,” he said. “We need to improve in that area.”

Gatland said he would also be looking for an improvemen­t in the catch-and-drive from the line-out, an effective tool in previous tour matches but successful­ly countered by New Zealand on Saturday.

Another key set piece moment came early in the second half when the NZ pack monstered the Lions scrum, leading directly to winger Rieko Ioane’s first try.

“The players will be critical of their own performanc­e and look at the aspects where we need to improve,” Gatland said of his tight five. – Reuters

 ??  ?? OPENING SALVO: New Zealand hooker Codie Taylor celebrates after scoring the first try against the British and Irish Lions in the first Test at Eden Park in Auckland yesterday.
OPENING SALVO: New Zealand hooker Codie Taylor celebrates after scoring the first try against the British and Irish Lions in the first Test at Eden Park in Auckland yesterday.
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