Fanie de Villiers speaks his mind on the choice of ball on the cricket tour of England _ and the UK press
CRICKET: Luke Alfred
IT’s a wet Monday morning in Southampton and Fanie de Villiers and I are sitting face to face in the back of the Proteas’ tour bus, sipping orange juice from the cartons and discussing the finer points of swing bowling.
“I like a Duke more than a Reader because I think a Duke swings a bit more. The seam isn’t as big as a Reader’s but at least the Duke is a ball that can swing,” Fanie explains. “The English players want to use it too, it seems to me. In any case, we’ve decided on the Duke; we’re going to play the Test series with the Duke and that helps a bit.”
The early part of the England tour hasn’t been that positive for De Villiers. As well as dealing with a minor knee injury which required a cortisone injection and kept him out of the games against Sussex and Hampshire, De Villiers has contributed somewhat controversially to the slow-burning debate about the future of English cricket. He ruffled a few feathers with some forthright views expressed at a sportswriters’ luncheon last week, claiming, among other things, that county bowlers were overworked.
Asked what he thinks is wrong with English cricket, he says: “They’re playing so many games that every second week _ because the standard is going down and the bowlers are tired _ someone scores a double hundred. Every third week someone is scoring 280 runs.”
This brings De Villiers to his next point, a gripe about the English media. “The media here are the worst I’ve seen,” he says with feeling. “And I want you to put that in your paper. The media back home are sometimes a bit negative, but they try to boost the team; the team is very dear to them. In this country they slate everyone that’s not doing well.
“If any clever reporter looks at the success ratio of a fast bowler, he’ll probably find that it’s one in five games. In England if a guy takes 10 wickets in one game and none in the next, they’ll say he should be dropped, he’s worthless, he didn’t swing the ball, what’s wrong with him …”
Asked how he’s enjoying his return to England after an absence of four years _ he played country cricket for Kent in 1990 _ he says he’s loving it. But he reverts to his theme.
“A guy wrote an article in the Sunday Times saying the South Africans are still the same; we still haven’t got a black player. We don’t need that. He hasn’t a bloody clue about what we’ve been doing with the development of cricket. It’s going to be a 10, 15-year project to get going.”
Does he see any disadvantages in playing a three-match, instead of five-match series? “I belive that three matches is right, four would be the limit,” he replies. “If you play five tests you’re away from home for six months. It’s not human. And why have a five-month tour when you can have a one-month one-day tournament somewhere and a three-month tour in the same year?”
The Proteas are loving England _ the name Jonty Rhodes is one everyone’s lips and the test matches have been sold out for months. Ultimately De Villiers is too charming and too self-possessed to be excessively bothered by the local media.
His talent isn’t for controversy. Whether with a Duke or a Reader, it’s for world-class swing bowling.
weren’t here to enjoy it, we were here to do a job. We were here for the Irish people to enjoy the World Cup.” The players had done everything he asked of them. “They’ve all battled their bollocks off. I like them all and I can’t help but feel sorry for them.
“Whatever Ireland does in the future we have got laxities in certain areas that have to be readdressed. We have got bits to do and people to look at, and people to give opportunities to, to see if they can stand up and handle it.
“We’ve basically got the nucleus of a good side: we’ve got people of the right age in numbers. We need to find a few more.
“There are one or two who have been with us for years and years, and I don’t know whether they will be part of the European Championship campaign or not.”
But would he himself? Reports in a Sunday tabloid had said he was quitting to become a paid director of Newcastle United. “I’m going to have a couple of months to just decide what I am going to do. I can stay in the job if I want. I will almost certainly take them through to the European Championship.
“But I want a little bit of time to think: to get a grip and a feel of the situation over the next couple of months. And I want a bit of time to make my mind up to see where I’m going.
“But I will almost certainly go on …” One minute definite, next minute hesitating. “… If the situation is right.”
He has been with the Irish eight years and never signed a contract. His record is played 82, won 41, drawn 28, lost 13. He is 58 years old, has many outside interests and is not short of money.
He would love “to tweak the noses of the English” in the European Championship in England in 1996.
Did his considerations include family affairs, business matters? “Oh, family things, FAI people. I want to get the general feel of things. Because I know the way things pan out.”
And then … Quite suddenly, and incomprehensibly for the people who know how he is sainted by the Irish, the reasons for the slight doubt filtered out.
“It only takes a couple of journalists in Ireland to start saying maybe it’s time we had a change, maybe some new ideas. I mean they will already be writing about the way we played in this competition, and whether I was right and whether I was wrong. I mean it’s things like that unsettle you and you go, `Wait a minute’.
“I will feel and be very susceptible to the attitude and what is happening round me. And if I feel there is the slightest chance that people might want a change, then they will have a change.”
Could he mean the Irish might not want him? A recent poll showed 38 per cent of the population made him the most popular man, against all comers, in Ireland.
Any successor would have an unenviable task, but Mick McCarthy, who had 57 caps and now manages Millwall, might grow into the mould.
“Will you be guided by the people?” asked Charlie Stewart, of the Irish Press.
“All sorts of little things affect me, Charlie. How you react, how he reacts, how everybody reacts in Ireland.
“There’s time for a change in everything. For me to definitely turn round and say to you I will be here for the European Championship … maybe they won’t want me.”
Stewart shook his head in disbelief. “It’s all right, Charlie, listen, I’ll tell you. I’ve been around a long time…”