I used to go to Wanderers a lot in the 1960's and 1970's and I think those days the selection norms were restricted At the time there was an impression that selection was restricted and it was very difficult to get into the team and very difficult for players like Richards to get in,
The national team in that period were great - as they were in the late 1990's and from 2006 to 2017 - by 2019 the bottom fell out of the Proteas and that was augmented by atrocious player selections - especially since 2018.
Lol Saffex
Remember when Coetzee dropped Faf De Klerk?
Same sames.
CSA rested on their laurels during the Smith era. We had a settled top six that hardly ever failed.
I can't see van Tonder, Erwee or Rickleton doing worse than Du Plessis and co, at least not in the shorter format. I say bring them all in. Get them in young and give them a fair go.
PS my patience with Markram is officialy klaar. Send him packing and see if he improves at club level. If not, too bad so sad, others deserve a shot. Jirr, him and Elgar have been useless in this competition.
Rassie and Miller are the only two I'd keep.
I'm talking about limited overs, Saffex.
Probably should have stated that.
The guy can't bat aggressively.
Saffex,
Even with the poor level of bowling on display, he didn't manage a single innings of note during this competition. And those performances fall in line with his limited overs batting record.
For me, it's not good enough.
His test average is 41. Not bad but not amazing in this day and age.
His ODI average is a measly 28. That's very well below par and he's played 26 games already.
Edit: Amla averaged 50 in ODIs :/
Unexplained why Richards was overlooked for that period as he was without doubt one of the best opening batsman in the world at that stage.
Pollock during 1963 was stationed in Tempe (Bloemfontein) at the 1st Tank Regiment and I was in the adjoining camp and during free time had a chance to bowl to him.
Graeme spent most of the time at practice as he was already a well known sportsman and all the Permanent Force staff went out of their way to meet his needs.
He was a gentlemen and a great batsman and unfortunately both he and Barry Richards suffered internationally as far as cricket was concerned due to a silly ban on Basil D by the then SA PM (Voster) being included in the MCC squad to tour SA.
Barry played pro cricket in England and OZ and was actually lost to cricket at home.
Sadly the world was robbed of two star batsman and who knows what heights they might have set in batting.
Politics, politics and more politics in sport.
Start looking at the opening batsmen before Richards were selected - in the main it was Goddard and Barlow. Goddard was for years captain of the side and Richards were in fact his replacement om 1970. Barlow was retained since he was a very good all-rounder.
It always was the case that it is far more difficult to get out of a SA cricket team than to get into the team.
Politics robbed lovers of cricket from seeing two of the all time greats take their place amongst the finest in cricket. We will never know.
Sies!
One of my dad's favourites , Roy McLean...a flamboyant, larger than life character. With Roy he said, never a dull moment, you never knew...either a duck or an innings where he clouted Tyson and Stathan for boundaries.
Also played flyhalf for Natal.
Roy Alastair McLean (9 July 1930 – 26 August 2007) was a South African cricketer who played in 40 Test matches between 1951 and 1964. A stroke-playing middle-order batsman, he scored over 2,000 Test runs, but made 11 ducks in 73 Test innings.[1]
McLean was born in Pietermaritzburg, Natal, and educated at Hilton College.[2] He shone at cricket, hockey and rugby union,[3] and was a strong enough rugby player to represent Natal at fly-half.[4]
As a cricketer, he made his first-class debut for Natal in 1949, and his Test debut on the 1951 tour of England at Old Trafford.[3] He established himself as an exciting and forceful middle- order batsman in the South African team. He was particularly successful on tour, hitting an unbeaten 76 to win the final Test of the 1952–53 tour to Australia, to square the series, despite Australia scoring 520 in their first Innings.[5] He played against the touring Australian rugby union team later in 1953, scoring a drop-goal as fly-half for Natal to win 15–14.[2][3]
He made his highest Test score in the 2nd Test at Lord's on the tour to England in 1955. Batting against a bowling attack that included Brian Statham, Fred Trueman, Trevor Bailey and Johnny Wardle, he rode his luck, hitting 21 fours and a six but being dropped several times, and scoring 142 of 196 the runs while he was at the wicket, before he was finally bowled by Statham.[1] Nevertheless, England won by 76 runs.[6] In the 3rd Test, at Old Trafford, he hooked Frank Tyson for four several times in the second innings, hitting 50 in 71 minutes before he was run out: South Africa won with 9 balls to spare.[7] He was the South African Cricket Annual Cricketer of the Year in 1955.[3] He and fast bowler Neil Adcock were the only successes of the 1960 tour of England.[5] He reached his highest first-class score, 207, against Worcestershire, and recorded the fastest century that season, in 75 minutes against A E R Gilligan's XI in a festival match at Hastings, despite only scoring 6 runs in the first half an hour.[1][2][3] Each was named as a Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1961.[5]
In 1961 he led an unofficial tour to England by a team of young players named the Fezelas. The team contained the nucleus of the great South African side of the late 1960s, with such players as Peter Pollock, Eddie Barlow, Colin Bland, Denis Lindsay and Peter van der Merwe, and was unbeaten on the tour.[5] In the 1966 Wisden Cricketers' Almanack the editor Norman Preston, reflecting on the success of the touring South Africans in 1965, paid tribute to "that exuberant character R.A. McLean ... who moulded the new Springboks when he brought the Fezela side to England in 1961".[8]
He played all five Tests when New Zealand toured in 1961–62, a final two Tests against England in South Africa in 1964–65, and retired from first-class cricket in 1966. He became an insurance salesman.[3]
McLean died in Johannesburg following a long illness.[2][4] He was survived by his wife of 51 years, Barbara, and their three daughters.
I am not saying that they were better than Richards - in fact I am implying the exact opposite by my remark on removing players past their sell-by dates from the team. Goddard as captain was just one of those and the problem is still a problem at present.
Goddard and Barlow were both all rounders of note.....followed by Bacher, Pollock, Bland/Lance, Lindsay. What we’d do for that group today.
That said Richards should easily make our all time team.....he should have been selected earlier.