SA cricket’s future not too rosy
It’s never popular in South Africa to say a sport is in trouble. At least not until everything falls apart, like South African rugby in 2016.
Now, the Springboks’ series whitewash against France has lifted the immediate gloom, but there are still many structural weaknesses.
But that’s not the discussion today.
Instead, it’s time to have a frank discussion over the state of SA cricket. Some will nod in agreement, given the way the tour to England has turned out so far.
Others will say that one bad tour can’t erase all of the gains of the last 18 months.
However, it looks increasingly as if last season’s Test series wins in Australia and New Zealand – as well as two ODI series whitewashes against the Aussies and Sri Lanka – were exceptions rather than the rule.
But what happens after the 2019 World Cup? It looks increasingly likely numerous established players will say goodbye after that.
This means AB de Villiers, Hashim Amla, Faf du Plessis, Morne Morkel, JP Duminy, Imran Tahir and possibly even Dale Steyn will be yanked out of the system.
There’s no doubt it will affect the Proteas massively. Depressingly, South Africa A’s tour of England was a bad reflection on national depth.
They didn’t win a single match and virtually no-one except Heino Kuhn, who’s 33, performed well. No new match-winners emerged.
There are some decent batters, but the bowling stocks are threadbare.
The only bowler in domestic cricket currently knocking on the door is Dane Paterson. And even he relies more on hard work and guts than inherent class.
The prospect of a new national coach being announced in September is supposed to be exciting. Yet in this case it’s tinged with doubt.
Geoff Toyana and Rob Walter have both been successful at domestic level, but they’ve also had poor seasons.
Collectively, they have 10 years’ experience as head coaches. AB de Villiers’ international career has lasted longer than that.
Are one of them the men to take an international team forward?
I honestly don’t know.