After exhausting all other avenues, SACA have taken CSA to court in a last-ditch attempt to get them to reveal the financial underpinnings of their decision to re-structure the domestic game from the beginning of the season after next.

They believe that the financial benefits of restructuring are, “untried and untested”, according to the court papers.

“Notwithstanding SACA’s requests, CSA has not made available the relevant information, nor the operational planning, that would permit an assessment of their claims [that re-structuring has financial benefits],” says SACA in their court submission. 

“Most importantly, despite its assertions to the contrary, CSA has not engaged in any consultation process, whether meaningful and constructive or at all, with SACA about the restructuring.”

Such restructuring will involve approximately 70 job losses for the current SACA membership of 311 professional cricketers.

The restructuring proposals involve adding six new first-class provinces to the current six franchises, meaning that 12 provinces will now contest the three domestic first-class competitions.

At the same time, the current 15 team semi-professional strata of domestic cricket will be abolished entirely.

The provinces that will be afforded first-class status in the new dispensation include those who are currently “junior partners” to the larger franchises. 

The new six include Boland, Border, Easterns, Griquas, North West and South Western Districts. There is a possibility that the six could be joined by Limpopo and Mpumalanga at a later date.

Even though CSA’s deficit figures have fluctuated – sometimes radically – over the past six months, they have made public the figure of R654-million. In April they announced a raft of “austerity plans” to address the shortfall. 

Such “austerity plans”, they said at the time, were an attempt to address “dwindling broadcast numbers… as well as an unstable sponsorship focus globally”.

But the figures upon which the austerity plans are predicted are dangerously under-inflated, argue SACA in their court papers. 

On page 68 of their 234-page submission, for example, they point out that the figure of R654-million takes neither future losses from the Mzanzi Super League (MSL), nor the likely decrease in the “per match” values of CSA’s current overseas broadcast rights agreement into account. 

“If the figures for the MSL and these per match values were both included, then the four-year deficit could amount to close to a billion rand and this could well give rise to the future financial collapse of the game of cricket in South Africa,” they argue.

The SA Players’ Association (SACA) was formed just before the 2003 Cricket World Cup and have historically had an itchy relationship with CSA. This has improved or worsened depending on personnel and circumstance, but never has it been as antagonistic as it now.

Tony Irish, the chief executive of SACA and Thabang Moroe, his counterpart at CSA, clearly don’t see eye-to-eye and the relationship has worsened significantly under Moroe’s stewardship.

Indeed, SACA has all but ceased to play a role in the governance of South African cricket. They used to sit on three CSA sub-committees – finance, cricket and the chief executive’s committee, with either voting or observer status – and now sit on none of the three.

They were also always invited to the annual CSA Awards Evening at CSA’s expense but attended this year’s Saturday night shindig at their own cost.

CSA was approached for comment via a Friday morning e-mail. They declined to respond.

ANA