No need for big brother: Amla is up for his biggest challenge

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TELFORD VICE, Johannesburg

“Now listen, chaps,” Trevor Goddard told a respectfully silent dressingroom in 1970, “Ali has been made captain and we will all support him.”

And that was that. Goddard, the senior man, had spoken and no-one would dare speak against him. Ali Bacher had indeed been made South Africa’s captain, and he did indeed have, instantly and enduringly, the support of all of his “chaps”.

Even that of Eddie Barlow, who had engaged Bacher in a robust battle for the captaincy that culminated in an intense first-class match at Newlands that began on New Year’s Day - three weeks before the start of the series against Australia. Barlow captained Western Province. Bacher led Transvaal. Both opened the batting.

Bacher scored 68 in the first innings only to be dismissed by Barlow, who also claimed three other wickets. But Barlow was out for 17. Then Bacher made 15, this time managing not to fall to Barlow. Bacher set Western Province a target of 492, and they had been reduced to 110/6 - with Barlow gone for 26, and still 156 runs away from victory - when a draw was declared.

“I wanted the Test captaincy and so did Eddie, and that was one of the most competitive matches I ever played in,” Bacher remembers. “But once the decision to appoint me was taken all the tension disappeared and we were all on the same side; we were one team. Trevor spoke before I even had a chance to speak. I was most grateful to him.”

Will Hashim Amla, whose appointment as Graeme Smith’s successor was announced on Tuesday, have a similar need for a big brother in the dressingroom? If so, who might that be in a South African team shorn of much of its experience by retirements? Also, what are Amla’s chances of winning the unanimous support of his players what with AB de Villiers having been considered a certainty for the captaincy before Amla’s belated bid for the job?

The answers to all of those questions are wrapped up in Amla himself. He is the biggest brother left in South African cricket, and he does not require a bodyguard. De Villiers, meanwhile, is almost devoid of ego: if he supports Amla, and he will, everyone else will, too.

But other issues remain. Could the captaincy of a team who built their stature on the backs of immense figures like Smith, Jacques Kallis and Mark Boucher, all of them no longer around, be more of an unwanted responsibility than a coveted position? Will Amla’s reserved nature and freakish self-discipline help or hinder his team - will he be able to shout down dissent if it becomes damaging, and will he be able to understand and work with players who do not do the right thing even though they know they should?

Boucher’s retirement was forced by injury, but those of Kallis and Smith are tied to Gary Kirsten’s decision to end his tenure as South Africa’s coach after the Champions Trophy in England last June. Kirsten took South Africa to the No. 1 Test ranking and, consequently, has become that rare thing - a prophet hailed in his own country.

However, that his experimental approach to the one-day side helped make it a headless chicken is not highlighted often enough. Doubtless, we will probably not hear a word said against Kirsten despite his Delhi Daredevils team, which bristled with the proven talents of Kevin Pietersen, Murali Vijay, JP Duminy and Ross Taylor, losing 12 of their 14 games and finishing bottom of the standings in this year’s edition of the Indian Premier League.

Kirsten remains a fine reader of players and situations, and he brought new ideas, the freedom to be human and the fulfillment of potential to South Africa’s Test team. But when he went, South Africa’s confidence went with him. Repairing it would be beyond many captains, and Amla will need help to do so.

Personality has never been more important in sport. Amla’s is old-fashioned: deferential, polite, respectful, humble, quiet unless he has something to say. These are all fine things to be, but they are not qualities South Africans expect from their captains. They are also nothing like the image presented to the world by Smith, who was never afraid to tell us what he really thought - an effective buffer against the irritations of leadership.

So far, Amla’s defence against the probing question has been a disarming smile. He will require more than that if he is to keep his sense of humour as he negotiates the minefield that stretches ahead of him. But, as Paul Harris said this week as he rebutted his own doubts over Amla’s lack of captaincy experience: “We know what he can do.” Quite. Once, Amla had a crooked backlift. Then, he became the No. 1 ranked batsman in Tests and one-day internationals.

Barlow had no trouble pledging his support to Bacher, but there was no keeping a good scallywag down. When the skipper failed to notice him warming up in the field, Barlow found a way to have a beseeching telegram delivered to the dressingroom during the tea interval: “Dear Doc, please give me a bowl. Eddie.”

Bacher has for years used a throwaway line to describe the duties of captaincy: “All I had to do was win the toss.” In a sense, he was right - he won all four of his tosses, and his team won all four of his Tests as captain.

Amla will not receive anything as direct a telegram from an unhappy player, and he will have to do much more than win the toss. But he knows that already.