Proteas captain Temba Bavuma cut a lonely figure at OR Tambo International airport last week as he arrived home from India unheralded and unremarked, in stark contrast to the tumultuous welcome by thousands of excited rugby supporters for the victorious Springboks only a few weeks earlier. The fans drooled over their rugby idols, took selfies with them and hung on their every word.
Poor Bavuma. Hardly a soul in sight to meet him or put a consolatory arm around his shoulder. He was instead left to plead for his job after the Proteas were beaten in the semifinal of the Cricket World Cup. He seemed perplexed by the rejection and calls for him to step down as captain.
The contrasting receptions for Bavuma and Siya Kolisi are of course a function of their teams’ performances on the field. It's the difference between success and failure.
One of the things that emerged clearly from the Springboks' triumph — and there were several lessons — is that many people aren't too bothered by the colour of a player’s skin as long as he's wearing green and gold. They'll celebrate their heroes despite the best endeavours of politicians to dissuade them. We just want a bunch of winners.
And that's how it should be. We should celebrate success and be intolerant of failure. Too many times we tend to make excuses for those who fail. It's always somebody else or the environment that causes them to fail. The individual is never to blame. He's not responsible, always the victim.
People understand the difference between success and failure, which is why they snubbed the Proteas. And they understand it in a way that Bavuma doesn't. Speaking in the near-deserted arrivals hall, he chafed at the idea that maybe it's time for him to fall on his sword. What for? What are the metrics?
There's no need to bamboozle people with big words. It's really not complicated. He should step down because he failed.
He may have won a few games, but he didn't win the tournament. If he had the trophy nestling in his arms as he spoke, there would be no calls for him to quit. He would have instead been smothered with love by thousands of fans. Never one to miss a chance, President Cyril Ramaphosa would probably also have been there, dangling a presidential medal.
But there he was, like his predecessors before him, making excuses. Same old story every four years. And one would have thought that the smart alecs who run the game would have figured it by now. No heads will roll. But people must learn to own up or get out when they stuff up.
What sticks in the craw is that we lost to the awful Australians, a team we thoroughly thrashed in the group stages after beating them here at home. But when it comes to the crunch that winning habit — and the confidence that comes with it — seems to simply evaporate.
Former Australian wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist sarcastically told his compatriots that they had nothing to worry about because the Proteas always contrived to sabotage their own chances. It was a typically arrogant thing to say. But he was proved right. We caved in once again.
Sport doesn't always get the credit for the role it plays, especially in a society like ours. It does not only unite the country, it also builds character
Bavuma had perhaps the best squad of players, especially in terms of batsmen, since AB de Villiers led his group of happy warriors to the 2015 edition of the world cup, which they painfully lost to New Zealand in the semifinals after the then sports minister Fikile Mbalula decided to play chief selector by insisting on fielding an unfit Vernon Philander. Then there was that absolutely brilliant line-up — Kallis, Cullinan, Klusener, Pollock, Boucher, Gibbs, Kirsten, Cronje, Donald, Rhodes — one salivates at the mere mention of their names — that comically lost to Australia (it's always Australia!) in the 1999 semifinal, earning us the chokers moniker.
All three teams were good enough to win the tournament. Teams lose games all the time, but the reason the chokers sobriquet has stuck is because we always come unstuck at crucial moments. And we're not going to shake off such a condescending label until we win the damn cup. So far the empty suits are as clueless as the rest of us as to how to get the monkey off our backs.
Sport doesn't always get the credit for the role it plays, especially in a society like ours. Not only does it unite the country, it builds character. Successful sports people often go on to make a success of the rest of their lives. We have to inculcate that winning culture among young people, especially as most of them, through no fault of their own, are bereft of hope or ambition. They need stars to look up to.
But unfortunately we tend, not only in sport but all other areas of life, to tolerate failure and to make excuses for those who fail. It starts at school. Pupils don't fail, teachers fail them. And next month politicians, with their plastic smiles, will be posing for the obligatory photographs with pupils who've eked out a 30% pass mark, a sure route to a life paved with disastrous consequences.
You can't fire an employee who deliberately stays at home unless you write and remind them to come to work, or they'll take you to the cleaners at the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation & Arbitration. We praise people who do the barest minimum, but shy away from calling out those who mess up.
Jacob Zuma destroys the country, but when he's brought to book some people howl and wonder what you're doing harassing such an old man. Even this week some people were celebrating the fact that the incompetent National Prosecuting Authority has yet again seriously mucked up another important case. Another crook off the hook, for now at least.
Success comes from hard work. That's the message that should be drilled into everybody, especially young people. You are, as they say, the master of your own fate. And there should be no sympathy or tolerance for those who fail us.
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