South Africa / News
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South Africa cricket
SA board chief loses selection veto
Cricinfo staff
June 18, 2008
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The key change involves divesting the board president of his veto power. "The present system in terms of which the president has the right to veto the selected team should be abolished," a CSA statement said.
"The president and board of CSA should continue to be the custodians of the transformation policy insofar as the national team is concerned," it added. "In this regard, [they] should continue to monitor the progress in achieving acceptable levels of representivity that will eventually reflect the demographic make-up of the country, but there should be a change of process whereby the CEO and convenor of selectors are required to manage the process and report regularly to the CSA president/board as the ultimate oversight and policy body."
"In selecting the national squad, the selectors shall consult with and have regard to the input of both the coach and the captain," the statement said. "The coach and convenor shall be responsible for the selection of the final eleven players to take the field. The captain takes charge once the playing eleven have been selected."
The issue of quotas, whereby every 15-man South African touring squad should include seven coloured players, has long been a thorny issue, but it came to a head before the tour of India in March. Nel was left out of the squad, in favour of Langeveldt, who later pulled out himself saying he was uncomfortable with the selection policy. In the end, Monde Zondeki was drafted in although didn't play on the tour.
Langeveldt has since signed a Kolpak deal with Derbyshire, effectively ending his international career, although Nel has resisted the temptation and has been named in the touring team for England.
The South African board set up a committee to review the transformation policy, and all 12 of the recommendations were approved at a recent meeting.
"The board also decided that the committee should continue its mandate and make further recommendations on how to increase black African representivity in South African cricket at all levels and focus on other areas of transformation," said Arendse.
The changes are a significant erosion of Arendse's powers and there is also a shift in emphasis to transformation needing to start at grass roots level and move up, rather than beginning with the international team.
"CSA must focus on lobbying the state and other stakeholders to make possible the main thrust of the transformation policy which is to provide facilities, resources and access in previously disadvantaged communities, with particular emphasis to black African areas, as no sport has the resources to achieve these goals on its own."
Another recommendation was to ensure the selectors have "the necessary experience, expertise and knowledge of the game and, additionally, are trusted to ensure that the team is representative and reflects the broad ethos of democratic South Africa and the principles of CSA's transformation policy."
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hi there is one more pertinant issue. The captain is removed from selectors panel. Most important he dont have any say in selection of the eleven also. what a rubbish idea. Now i dont think the captain will take responsibilty of the failure of the team. How far a captain will be comfortable if he cannot pick the team and have to play with the team decided by somebody else.
Posted by ashwin_547 on (June 19 2008, 16:17 PM GMT)The quota system, although effective, has too many problems associated with it. The main is that good players who are white dont get their fair dues, and 2nd players like Kevin Pietersen, Ryan ten Doeschate, Matt Prior, Andrew Strauss and a few more dont get their fair due on the South African squad. Also I think it is ridiculous not to have the captain in the selection squad. Thats rubbish, he knows the players best so he should be the biggest part of it or one of them.
Posted by Henry_Kane on (June 19 2008, 14:08 PM GMT)representivity - what kind of a word is that? Still I suppose it's representative of the way cricket's going these days. Loads of hot air and management speak.
Posted by kamrud on (June 19 2008, 13:37 PM GMT)I left South Africa 6 years ago after attending a Natal High Schools meeting which was held at Kingsmead and this meeting was after 6 years of unification of High School cricket in KZN. The meeting went on and on because no from NCU had the guts to tell the teachers from the so call whites school when to get off! mate's what has changed? You "CANNOT PLAY NORMAL SPORT IN AN ABNORMAL SOCIETY" I just want give CSA some advise about the way junior Cricket his handle in Victoria Australia The schools do not handle junior cricket and state selection for Victoria,from under 13 to under 18 his handle by the cricket clubs and Cricket Victoria who are responsible so if you do not have a good club structure which reports to good State structure then you are wasting you time and the kids time.CSA and NCU need to go and Have look at Chatsworth Sporting Club from KZN an find out what did they do to produce kids that have the potential to be playing for South Africa soon if given the chance.
Posted by DmitryFCZ on (June 19 2008, 12:30 PM GMT)I agree, that it is right, to fight against racism, no doubt, but just look: every 15-man South African touring squad should include seven colored players, which means: no more than 8 white" players-isn't that racism against white players???
Posted by ramkicool on (June 19 2008, 12:24 PM GMT)Having read all the comments above, i have come to one conclusion that most of the non-white people do not get enough opportunities at the grass root level. If this is the case then the board should take the necessary steps to eliminate this problem. But if they keep selecting people just to fulfill the quota system they would be losing a lot of players. It is sad that they haven't learned even after losing a player like Kevin Pietersen. If getting rejected on the basis of skin is racism, then getting selected on that basis is racism too. I do hope that a great team like SA doesn't suffer because of this.
Posted by xhosa on (June 19 2008, 12:12 PM GMT)you all are losing the plot .... we should not worry about colour playing part in any type of selection system. South Africa is supposed to be a democracy which means ..... no discrimination. I mean after all .... we are not supporting politicians .... we are supporting cricket .... we should be proud of any team that they pick. There should not be a claim made about putting in a player that is not worth of playing in his position .... guys saying that Herchelle Gibs should not have made the team because of his colour is clearly confused .... he is a brilliant sportsman albeit cricket, rugby ..... I mean .... are there much better fielders in the world. We should pick a team that could be a representation of the best sportsmen in this sport and that will be the only way that we can be classified as one the best teams in the world. Leave politics ... play cricket.
Posted by racosin on (June 19 2008, 11:48 AM GMT)everyone knows kevin piertersen was lost due to the policy...but the brighter side is nitini as one of their strike bowlers..guess on the long run both good and bad comes out of this kind of policy.
Posted by dwillemv on (June 19 2008, 11:05 AM GMT)If I were a non-white national player, I would find it an insult to be called a quota player. It implies that I only play for the team because my skin color is right and not because I'm good enough. And speaking of equality, where is the white players in the SA soccer team? Maybe that's why they can't even beat most small nations. Ok maybe I'm being a little harsh, but the same is happening with our sport that happened during apartheid. That is that skin color plays a bigger part in selection than talent. If someone is good enough they will be noticed.
Posted by Jakkals on (June 19 2008, 11:00 AM GMT)I firmly believe that I am right in saying that transformation should start at grassroots level and go on to provincial level. Yes apartheid is the worst thing mankind has ever seen, but you cannot fix this from the top down. It's a fact that the black schools do not have cricket as a sport and white schools again do not have soccer for that matter. Yes maybe you could blame that on Apartheid too, but somewhere we must stop blaming Apartheid for everything that is wrong in this beautiful country of ours. The guys Mikewl mentioned had to go to white schools because cricket isn't played in black schools. The people responsible for transformation in sport should invest their money by going out and find some more Ntini's out their, set them up in a school with a good cricket programme. Then make sure they get a provincial contract where if they are good enough should be selected for the national team.