Time to rebuild and create new cricket heroes

Graeme Smith has been Cricket South Africa’s acting director of cricket for six weeks now and, as far-ranging as his brief is, he has identified a mixture of possible solutions to the malaise that seems to affect the game at all levels in this country.

The victory in the first Test against England at Centurion is increasingly looking like a false dawn as the Proteas have lost the last two in a row now, and seven of their last eight Tests. The national women’s side and the SA A team have endured at best mixed results recently, while the SA U19s’ loss to Afghanistan in the opening match of their World Cup, in Kimberley, was merely the culmination of an awful run of results that cast serious doubts on the selection of that team.

The franchise game has been particularly hard hit by Kolpak departures and the standard is of concern, especially the weak bowling attacks that seem to proliferate. For all CSA’s considerable efforts and the amount of resources thrown at transformation, not enough quality Black African players are being pushed through the pipeline and excelling at domestic level.

The one solution that arguably South Africa’s greatest captain seems pretty certain about is that people of greater expertise need to be brought in at all levels, especially in terms of coaching.

“South African cricket has lacked direction and leadership and we have to get better people in helping. Coaching is a huge issue because these are the people grooming our youth that are coming through. We’re talking about it and looking at maybe adding more depth to our coaching structures, but there are also budget constraints. But we have to make sure that our coaches are skilled enough.

“To find a clear direction for domestic cricket is hard, we’re still trying to figure that out because there are so many elements involved – financial sustainability, the need to bring players through, its role in the high performance pipeline both in terms of the national team and transformation.

“The whole system certainly needs a more in-depth look, but there are probably two main problem areas – how we identify talent better and bring it through quicker, and up-skilling coaches. Domestic cricket has lost a lot of senior players, so we need to rebuild and create new heroes,” Smith said this week.

South Africa still produces very good cricketers – one only has to look at the number of expats in overseas teams to see this. But as rugby has found out, we’re not very good at utilising all these riches. One certainly cannot accuse CSA of ignoring development nor transformation.

Their commitment has been backed by hundreds of millions of rand spent on these programmes…but sadly the returns have not been very good.

These hundreds of millions of Rands sadly still cannot build all the facilities and infrastructure the country’s millions of youth, hungry for opportunity, need – that is government’s responsibility.

But the systems are CSA’s responsibility and it is time they relook their entire set-up.

One of the problems highlighted in the media’s meeting with Smith came from stalwart Cape Town cricket writer Zaahier Adams – too many of the coaches at junior level are learning on the job while also trying to teach the youngsters.

It doesn’t matter how much money is spent if the tuition being given is all rather aimless. A more focused approach is definitely needed at junior levels.

Smith also spoke of the need for getting more and better mentors and talent scouts on the ground. He seemed to confirm the suspicion of many that our domestic cricket is not properly preparing players for the Proteas.

“It’s about how we identify talent and who works on it. We need more mentors, talent scouts and camps. We can’t rely on the system to just spit these players through, it’s about how we bridge the gap because international cricket is very different in terms of the pressures, the quality of play and the many more eyeballs focused on it. We’ve got to get our players ready for that,” Smith said.

Thrown in at the deep end to replace the suspended Corrie van Zyl, Smith is facing a multitude of challenges. He will no doubt err along the way, but it is encouraging to hear the enthusiasm and determination he has. In the meantime, patience and support is required.