Cricket in South Africa is already in a very bad state. This is according to Proteas’ former wicketkeeper and batsman Mark Boucher. He sees the Cricket South Africa or CSA is in a dire state and that the Mzansi Super League or MSL can’t really help when it comes to the problems that CSA has.
The CSA has recently been making a noise because of the recent suspension of its three senior officials. Allegedly, the three officials have neglected their duties in a payment dispute. This was a dispute between the South African Cricketers Association or SACA and the CSA’s MSL.
The suspended officials are Corrie van Zyl, the interim director of the CSA, Nassei Appiah, the Chief Operating Officer, and the Head of sales sponsorship Clive Eksteen. The three were asked to leave the building after a meeting at Cricket SA’s head office in Johannesburg.
A statement was already released regarding this. It is said that the three are involved in the non-payment of fees to players after last year’s MSL. The dispute with SACA was mainly about CSA’s failure to pay the players for the use of their image rights during the last MSL.
Eksteen has already been suspended in the past. That happened after he posed for a picture in a Sonny Bill Williams mask during a Test between South Africa and Australia last year. He was asked about the latest controversy he’s in but refused to comment on the matter.
Van Zyi was asked to comment on the issue CSA is involved in recently, but all he had to say was, “Please respect, I don’t want to talk.”
An investigation will take place to determine the extent of the unfulfilled duties of the said employees of CSA. CSA also already said that they are already talking to SACA to settle things. They already agreed to pay the players involved all the due fees immediately.
CSA’s chief executive, Thabang Moroe, said, “CSA wants to reassure all cricket fans and all cricket stakeholders that our organization and indeed our staff adhere to the highest ethical standards in all our dealings and that consistency and accountability remains uppermost in all our processes and procedures.”
He also said that it is CSA’s expectation that all its staff and members, even including third-party stakeholders, protect the reputation of CSA and cricket in general at all times.
Cricket is known to be the second most popular sport in South Africa as football is still on top. Still, this makes cricket as one of the sports that has quite a following in the country. It’s also a popular choice when it comes to wagering on physical bookies and cricket betting apps as sports betting is completely legal in South Africa.
The CSA is now dealing with two court cases. One of these is brought by the professional players. It is about the restructuring of the local cricket games.
While all these are happening, the rise of cricket is still struggling in this country as CSA is facing a crisis when it comes to the performances of its national teams. The Proteas, for example, has had a dismal performance in the 50 during the World Cup. They were even whitewashed during the three Test series in India recently.
Both men’s and women’s Proteas teams struggled in India recently. The under-19 boys’ team has lost more matches compared to the number of times they won in the last year. This is quite an all-time low, but the team will still play in the World Cup on home soil next year.
This is what mainly made Mark Boucher think that cricket in South Africa is in a bad state and serious trouble. He said, “We’ve got ourselves into a pretty bad state. Hopefully, there are some clever heads there to try and turn things around.”
What Boucher doesn’t want to happen is to make people think that everyone in the industry is sugarcoating the situation South African cricket is in at the moment. He also doesn’t want to rely on the tournament to fix the issues. This is despite the fact that he believes that the tournament will do well this year.
He said in an interview with SA Cricket Mag, “The tournament will be well supported as it was last year, but we’ve got to be very careful with putting too much emphasis on this tournament. There are bigger problems that need to be sorted out.”