Neil's England Diary - Week 2
Day 9, 7 December
One of the more disappointing character traits of South African sports fans is a propensity to give our teams a good kicking when they are down – whether they deserve it or not. Seemingly, that extends to those who really don’t deserve it, like CSA’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr Shuaib Manjra, who was responsible for creating the bio-secure environment in which the Proteas were to have played their six internationals against England.
Expectations that South Africa could emulate the ECB’s remarkable achievement of conducting a completely Covid-free tour were unrealistic – and Manjra said so before the tourists arrived.
“I could not be more disappointed but I said before the tour that we should expect some positive tests and that the question would be how we treated and managed them. The ECB created a ‘vacuum’ for their international season at enormous cost – and at two venues perfect for the requirements with on-site hotels,” Manjra said.
“It was suggested to me that the term ‘bio-secure’ is revisited because I don’t believe it is financially or logistically possible for any other country to create the environment that the ECB did in their summer, without enforcing a virtual police state. Even in New Zealand recently there were six positive tests among the Pakistan squad while they were in ‘managed quarantine.’
“I believe we reacted timeously and operated safely when we had positive tests and I am also confident that the two venues and the hotel did all that they could to keep a secure perimetre around them. But this is a virus that the whole world has struggled to contain and control,” Manjra said.
Manjra said he was “personally devastated” by the cancellation of the tour having invested many hundreds of hours to secure its success. It was impossible not to feel for him when the England players said they had had enough, despite Manjra’s confidence that the positive test cases had been dealt with timeously and safely.
Former England captain and current, brilliant Sky TV analyst, Nasser Hussain, laid bare the reasons that Eoin Morgan and his men were unwilling to play the remaining two games of the series:
“Some of them have this window to get to Australia [for the Big Bash] and sit in quarantine, or a window of getting home, seeing family and have a bit of time where you're not passing Covid tests and everything is on top of you.
“This was the final straw when the bubble was breached. The players must have just got 'enough'. The last thing any player would have wanted in the next two or three days is to pick up Covid from a bubble which has been breached. That's the worst-case scenario.
“There is no good time to get Covid. But getting it now before Christmas and taking it back home to relatives is an absolute nightmare and they were not willing to risk that,” Hussain said.
Manjra and his team will now focus their attention on the Sri Lanka tour with the Boxing Day and New Year’s test matches at stake. The next tourists are due to arrive on 18 December, just six days before the first test.
Day 8, 6 December
It rarely gets more depressing than this. Sitting in an empty commentary box fours hours after arriving at Boland Park and two hours after the game should have started.
“We are deeply regretful of the situation given the amount of time and energy that has been put in place to host a successful tour. We will continue to give the England team all the support that they need. We are in continuous talks with the ECB as we navigate the situation under the guidance of our combined medical teams,” said CSA Director of Cricket, Graeme Smith.
He might have added “money” to “time and energy” but, sensibly, did not. It would not be becoming for an administrator to talk finances when the primary focus is on the health and safety of the players and support staff. But you can be quite sure he is thinking about both the cost of staging this tour and of the lost income in television rights.
Then there are the owners of the illustrious, five-star Vineyard Hotel which has been in the same family for three generations. They are not responsible for the construction of the bio-secure bubble, or its maintenance – there is a police-controlled command centre for that and CSA’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr Shuaib Manjra is responsible for the design and protocols.
Yet all of them will be feeling as confused and dejected as each other. Security has been in great supply, from the blue-light, uniformed variety to cameras in the hotel corridors and entry and exit points. The perimeter fence, designed to keep unwanted visitors out, is equally effective in keeping guests in. Nobody has yet been able to figure out how the protocols were breached. Or, indeed, whether they were breached. The whole world knows how difficult thee virus is to control or contain.
At the moment the second and third games are scheduled to proceed as planned at Newlands on Monday and Wednesday night but, given the gloom which has descended on the tour, that seems highly unlikely at the moment. If the two positive tests in the England camp are confirmed, they are likely to have to quarantine in their hotel rooms for at least 10 days and the tour will be cancelled immediately.
It has been another long and lonely day. And a very expensive one.
Day 7, 4 December
It was an hour and 40 minutes before the scheduled start of play and there was clearly something wrong. The ‘advance parties’ of both squads would normally have arrived to start setting up nets and cones for the players' warm-ups. The Newlands outfield was deserted.
The Sky TV crew were waiting patiently by the side of the outfield. Michael Atherton asked whether I had heard any news. It dawned on me immediately. Although there were other possibilities, it was instantly clear that it was a Covid incident.
The Newlands stadium staff and management had already been told to prepare the venue for an international on Monday night and, an hour later, it emerged that the three-match series would now start at Boland Park on Sunday with the remaining matches at Newlands on Monday and Wednesday.
Bizarrely, my first thoughts were for the TV cameramen and crew who would have to de-rig their equipment late into the night in Paarl on Sunday and drive straight to Newlands to lay cables for the new rig after midnight before finishing the job early on Monday morning after a few hours sleep.
My second thought was one of deep sympathy for CSA’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr Shuaib Manjra, who has worked tirelessly for months to establish the Covid protocols that would see the tour proceed safely and successfully. He was at a loss to explain how the latest positive test came about.
The third thought was for the one player upon whose shoulders millions of rands of lost income could rest. Manjra was categoric in his belief that no player or member of the management staff had breached the bubble – or even that a breach was possible given the security, both people and cameras, in place at the Vineyard Hotel.
If there is one further positive test, the tour will be called off and England will return home. And what happens to the rest of the summer? Roll on the vaccine…
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