South Africa travel to new fields in trophy hunt

South Africa will go left field, including looking at other sports, in its quest to win a World Cup. Gerald Majola, CSA's chief executive officer, said it would also look at improving transformation among black Africans and the amateur cricket structure.

"We've been number one or two in the world for a long time, but we don't win major events. We can't find a solution" Majola told the Gauteng audience of the CSA road show at the Wanderers on Thursday.

It's not for a lack of trying. Majola and his team organised meetings with players, coaches and administrators to find out why they thought the team couldn't bring home ICC silverware. "All the discussions were in secret, so no one would know what anyone else said. Everyone could say what they wanted to," Majola explained. Then added, tongue in cheek: "Like the Gibbs book."

Those meetings brought them no closer to a solution, so experts such as manager of coaching Anton Ferreira were deployed to other countries, including England and Australia, to analyse their winning skills. Similarly, people from those countries were invited to South Africa to examine where they were lacking. "Sadly, they found that our systems are the best in the world. We have the best structures," lamented Majola.

Hence the plan to think out of the box. "We are going to look at other sports and see how their teams prepare for major tournaments. In 2008, I went to Chelsea (football club) and saw that the way they do things compared to us is like chalk and cheese. Maybe the solution is outside cricket. We are going to appoint a consultant to look at other sports for us, because I believe we can win all the World Cups."

Beyond what he may have found at Stamford Bridge, Majola cited transformation among black Africans and a worrying amateur cricket structure as two credible reasons for South African cricket sometimes stalling - two "glaring weaknesses".

"We did a transformation review last year and it became evident that the pace of transformation on the black African community is slow. We have three black Africans on the CSA board and we will be sending them on an audit to find out where the Africans are in our structures at all levels." Majola's point has only been emphasised by the international retirement of Makhaya Ntini, the first black African to represent South Africa, on Tuesday. Ntini was considered the black face of the game in the country.

Despite the lack of consistent black African representation in cricket, Majola insisted that there would be no quotas. "I have been in this job for ten years and we have not used the word quota. We believe in targeted transformation. It's not a numbers game. At national level, the target is four players of colour. They've used two, three and sometimes five players. If the target cannot be met, we will look for reasons to explain that. We want to make sure that people who play at the national level are capacitated to play there."

CSA created the franchise system six seasons ago to prepare players for higher honours and Majola said he believed that decision wass paying dividends with the likes of David Miller, Colin Ingram and Rusty Theron all performing for South Africa. The concern now is that the amateur players come into the franchise system undercooked.

For that reason, CSA want to add a semi-professional competition to their season. The competition will involve all 14 teams who compete in the current provincial three-day and one-day tournaments, and will consist of a twenty-over event. "It will be played before the Standard Bank Pro20. The national selectors will pick players out of that tournament to form two teams, one Inland and one Coastal. Those two teams will play in an expanded, eight team Pro20 and should one of them progress to the final, they will be eligible to play in the Champions League," explained Majola. The proposal for this competition is still in the planning phase and will be put to the board on November 19 for approval.

Majola's aim is to create enough depth to keep the national team strong and among the top four revenue draw-cards in world cricket. "India are number one, and England second. South Africa and Australia are third and fourth. We are closer to third because of our timezones," said Majola, who thinks South Africa can clinch third place more firmly. "If Australia's cricket continues to go the way it is, they could be in serious trouble."

CSA reported a turnover of Rand 492 million ($72 million) with a profit of R143 million ($21 million), largely thanks to the Champions Trophy. "This season we expect a turnover of R700 million ($102 million), because we are hosting India," Majola said.

This season will not only be a first for CSA in terms of breaking revenue bounds, but also from a television coverage perspective. Previously CSA sold both the production itself and the rights, but now they own the production while only the rights have been sold to SuperSport. Majola explained that this will allow them to instruct the producers to put sponsors on screen at given times because "it's important that they are shown," and to highlight CSA's development programmes. "We can have an insert on KFC mini-cricket, for example." Kass Naidoo, CSA's brand and corporate relations manager, was quick to add that "SuperSport's independence is always guaranteed."

CSA have visited all 12 venues since mid-September for their road show, taking with them information on the body, its structures. They've also tried to spread their message of "good governance and diligence" amid an inquiry into bonus payments made after the Indian Premier League. Majola repaid over R1 million ($140,000) after it was alleged that he took the money without proper authorisation. The findings of an internal review into the payments are expected in two weeks time. Will CSA adopt the same candid attitude to that as they did to their road show? Majola insists his message is simply that "there are no Holy cows."