The State of The Game
It's not broken in one place, it's broken in many places
South Africa needs to rebuild the red ball game, and it will take more than picking a different set of players for Test cricket duty. That would be putting paper over the problem.
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The 2022/23 Test series is the last time in a long while before South Africa faces Australia in a Test series again. The two sides will not meet again between now and 2026. Whether or not the two teams will meet after 2027 - after the collapse of the World Test Championship - will depend on whether the respective boards can find common ground.
In a way, this could be the end of one of Test cricket’s great rivalries. Whether the end is permanent or temporary, the rivalry is not ending with a bang, it ends with a whimper. Statistically, the Proteas have sent in their weakest batting lineup in ages. This fact is not lost on the players themselves. Upon returning home from the Test series against England, some players shared that they had experienced a culture shock. Domestic cricket had not done enough to prepare them for the intensity they encountered in England.
Shortly after their arrival, in October 2022, South African cricketers formally requested SACA, South African Cricketers Association, to do a formal inquiry into the state of domestic cricket. They had decided that something had to be done about the standard of the game, and because they were not hearing anything from CSA along those lines, they decided to take the initiative. The intensity of matches, the pitches, the scheduling of matches, the levels of professionalism... The consensus was that the state of the game had regressed.
The state of the game (especially red ball cricket), the players felt, was broken.
T20 cricket has been cited as the reason red ball cricket is broken. That is right, but not in the way many people seem to think. The fissures did not start overnight. The first fissure came into place when the Under-19 3-Day tournament was reduced from being a provincial to a regional competition. Shortly afterwards, the tournament was scrapped altogether.
“There is first a foundation phase which takes time to dig and build, and then the building itself of bricks on top of each other, with then finally the frilly expansive add on’s and bits nearer the top of the building after the foundations are solid and in place…” says Dave Nosworthy.
The tournament provided players with a strong foundation from which they could build their game before stepping into the semi-pro and professional setting. South Africa’s golden generation of Test players took part in the tournament. The last cohort to take part in it was around 2009/10.
The scrapping of the Under-19 3-Day tournament was followed by the scrapping of declaration cricket in schoolboy cricket. 50-over cricket was also scaled back in most CSA-supported schools in favour of T20 cricket because the shorter format was cheaper to run. The next part of the pipeline to be affected was the provincial semi-pro circuit. Unless players were incredibly gifted, they played semi-pro cricket where they sharpened their skills before moving up to the franchise level.
The Proteas’ golden generation of Test cricketers passed through this point.
In Crickonomics, Tim Wigmore and Stefan Szymanski note that the quality of Sri Lankan first-class cricket was eroded as more and more teams acquired first-class status. With 26 first-class teams, the talent pool was diluted and a greater chasm was created between first-class and international cricket. South Africa has followed in Sri Lanka’s footsteps with their move from strength versus strength to a bigger league.
Six teams might have not been enough to sustain the number of cricketers produced by the South African school system, but 16 first-class teams were also too much, especially considering that some of those unions were unprepared for this status. CSA has been too preoccupied to notice this.
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In the year 2000, the West Indies had the second-best record after Australia. They had won 134 Tests, lost 93, tied one and drawn 126. New Zealand, on the other hand, had the second-worst record with just 44 wins from their 276 Tests while losing 111. Twenty years later, the West Indies were at the bottom in Test cricket and New Zealand was heading towards their first title, the World Test Championship.
Between 2000 and 2020 New Zealand won 63 and lost 64. In the same period, the West Indies had won 43 and lost 108. For both teams, the change started in the boardroom. One board embraced reforms and made decisions that put cricket first, while individuals also stepped forward and helped the game to develop. The West Indies’ board, on the other hand, was preoccupied with other matters, held on to old ways, was riddled with factionalism and made non-cricket decisions that affected the game.
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Over the past five years, CSA has been preoccupied with other things and focused less on the welfare of the game in the country so much so that three unions with first-class status have been operating without CEOs for the past three years. They have been on autopilot. To say things are messy is an understatement.
“Some of our top schools run their cricket programs better some unions,” one coach shared with me.
Couple a cheapened first-class system with a short first-class season, and the result is not pretty to look at. South African first-class teams play a maximum of seven matches a season. They do not help much. Cricket is a summer sport and it generally rains in summer. If one match is washed out, that leaves six.
At 23, Australian allrounder Cameron Green has played 48 first-class matches. He averages 9.6 first-class matches a season and that is before you factor in the 18 Tests he has played since 2020. Marco Jansen made his international debut a year after Green, he has played half the number of Tests. Back in SA, 24-year-old Joshua Richards has played 32 first-class matches. He averages around six first-class matches a season.
South Africa is a country that believes that young batters should learn to score runs at first-class level before they make the step up to international cricket. This a prudent move. However, that also means that rising stars like Tristan Stubbs and Jordan Hermann have to play for at least four seasons before they are able to satisfy CSA’s selection checklist. Dewald Brevis, who has not yet played a first-class match, will be asked to wait for longer. Whether at international or domestic level, South Africa just doesn't play enough red ball cricket.
The Proteas have always been CSA’s highest revenue source. The men’s team generated 85% of CSA’s revenue. They needed the Proteas to do well to earn money and attract sponsors. They still do, even with SA20 in the picture. SA20 will provide a second and reliable source of income, but CSA’s brand and the future of South African cricket are still heavily dependent on how well the Proteas do. But, for the Proteas to do well, they need a healthy pipeline.
“A team is as good as its depth. When we had the number one Test team in the world, we knew that the 15 or so players in the SA A team averaged over 40 with the bat. The first-class system was strong,” says Dave Nosworthy. “Besides one or two not selected for the tour to Australia, there is not much in the way of high batting averages. The system has bred too many players averaging in the 30s.”
Hence, the sending over a team with the lowest domestic and international averages, and 100s to Australia in 90 years, since the 1931/32 tour down under. Besides the non-selection of a handful of cricketers with highers averages like Janneman Malan, Ryan Rickelton and others, this is the best of local cricket. Batters are just not scoring a bucketload of runs.
The only way to get over this hurdle is if CSA worked with curators across the country. In 2021, Joe Root called for county pitches to be made better to help prepare batters for Test cricket. “You want guys to come into this environment of Test cricket and have that knowledge of what it’s like to go out in the second innings and know the opposition has 450 on the board,” he said.
Root said that it was important that ways were found to make games last four days. Improving the standard of pitches around the country was one of the many things that helped New Zealand develop world-class batters.
South Africa’s production line of world-class batters is experiencing problems. The standard is slipping. The growing chasm between South Africa’s domestic cricket and county cricket is easily noticeable. Despite his obvious talent, David Bedingham stands head and shoulders above many local batters thanks to county cricket. Ryan Rickelton rediscovered his form after his stint in county cricket. Wiaan Mulder too. It might be coincidental, but the coincidence is forming a pattern.
The unavailability of international players due to poor scheduling is not helpful to the development of a healthy pipeline. Unlike the previous generations that often competed against the Shaun Pollocks and Dale Steyns of this world, South Africa’s next generation rarely competes with South African internationals. “The system is made stronger when Proteas players are involved and passing on knowledge to the system,” says Nono Pongolo.
“The domestic game is in more trouble than many realise,” another coach told me.
The fissures have been increasing over time, and added together, they now form a gulf between the Proteas and the top Test cricket-playing teams. The home win against India was in spite of their circumstances. Coming from behind in New Zealand was another such circumstance. The two series allowed people to paper over the problems in the system.
“We did not rise to number 2 in the WTC because of our batting, we were carried to that point by our bowling,” says one cricketer.
The pipeline is not healthy and players are pushing for something to be done.
Hi Chiwanza
Your analysis raises some interesting issues. Nonetheless, it always surprises me that whenever a country is soundly beaten, the domestic competition is always used as an easy scapegoat . Not so long ago England were well beaten in Australia and everyone came trotting out blaming the state of country cricket for the malaise of the England national side. Not even two years later, England is taking the cricket world by storm with its 'bazzball' style cricket. What happened within such a short space of time? Did the state of county cricket suddenly improve?
We forget that despite our own 'broken' domestic competition, the Proteas were on the cusp of winning the much-vaunted England cricket team in their own backyard before we threw it away with some bad selection decisions for the second test.
There are some brilliant talent in the domestic league with averages in their 40s who are being overlooked because of an antiquated selection policy. Why was someone like Janneman Malan with a first class average of 48 overlooked as a test opener ahead of Sarel Erwee who boasts a domestic average of only 38? How long must Raynard van Tonder have to wait before he gets an opportunity in any of the national sides?
If I must point out a weakness of the current system it is that we are not producing enough good quality black batsmen that can make it in the domestic league and at test level. I would love to see a 'Brian Lara' emerging from the dusty townships in the Eastern Cape or Gauteng - the impact this would have on the black youth of our country would simply be phenomenal.
Thanks CS, very interesting, well written and important article. It is great that players and SACA are taking action. Also great that journalists like yourself are writing about it and investigating. Lets hope that things improve!