The pre-1991 world of South Africa was one of condemnable darkness. The burden was apartheid, a system of legislation that upheld segregationist policies against non-white citizens of South Africa brought about by the National Party that gained power in 1948. Cricket was under no enchanted spell that could protect it from the pangs of this vile system of institutionalised racial segregation. The ramifications were far-reaching, as this came as a bane to the careers of innumerable talented cricketers.
Basil D’Oliveira, a Cape Coloured South African of mixed descent was on the brink of becoming yet another victim to the then prevalent system. Despite being a gifted young cricketer, the best he could afford was to play a few games here and there on the gravels of Signal Hill only because of his skin colour. As he watched white South Africa play Test matches from the cage at the Newlands in the 1950s, he saw his cricket career spiral into a crevasse while players with half his calibre became stars.
But fate decided to take him down a different path. In 1960 English cricket writer and friend John Arlott somehow managed to set him up for a season with Middleton in Manchester. D’Oliveira grabbed the opportunity with both hands, knowing very little of the fact that he would be making his Test debut for England just a few years down the road.
D’Oliviera soon became a dependable guy with both the bat and ball in the English set-up. With crucial performances on a constant basis, he was pretty much living the English dream. But dark clouds soon began to take shape above him thanks to his own good returns. Yes, you read that right. As England drew nearer and nearer to their scheduled tour of South Africa in the southern summer of 1968-69, it became quite obvious that D’Oliveira would be in the touring party.
(Photo by PA Images via Getty Images)
In the summer of 1968 Australia were touring for the Ashes and in the first Test defeated England by 159 runs. D’Oliveira scored an unbeaten 87 in the second innings in addition to bowling figures of 2-45 – and he was dropped!
Bewildered, he returned to county cricket and performed moderately. However, on the eve of the fifth Test, when Roger Prideaux withdrew from the final Test with pleurisy, D’Oliveira was recalled. With a determination as firm as a diamond, he called up his wife Naomi on the eve of the game and said, “Pull up a chair, I’ll be in all day”. And the rest is history, albeit with sprinkles of luck in the form of dropped catches and close calls.
Dolly ended with a score of 158, hitting 21 boundaries along the way. His ton at the Oval was a fascinating concoction of brilliance, perseverance and, above all, fate paving the way for him through the excuses of illness, injuries and dropped catches.
The knock all but cemented his spot in the team to South Africa. Tensions started to rise in his land of birth, with Prime Minister John Vorster in the hub of the affairs. As a matter of fact the South African government began pulling strings as early as January 1968 when they smelled the possibility of Dolly making it to South Africa with the English side. Hence they made it clear to a Marylebone Cricket Club representative that if D’Oliveira were selected, the tour would be called off.
There were even offers of lucrative bribes for Dolly to step aside. Tienie Oosthuizen, a leading figure in the British branch of Carreras Tobacco, offered him a jaw-dropping offer of coaching South Africa provided he refused to go on the tour. There were also whispers in the winds that there was another mammoth offer on the table for him worth £40,000 (approximately A$1.04 million in 2022 currency) from Vorster’s personal initiative. But each time the answer was a straight-out no.
The very next day after the South African government had called the MCC threatening to call off the tour, the English squad was announced, and to everyone’s surprise, D’Oliveira was not in it. Marylebone had succumbed to filthy political pressures, and it resulted in a massive public outcry.
The fans were left shell-shocked. The members of the Parliament erupted in protest. The man himself broke down in tears. The MCC saw a flurry of resignations. But before the malevolent South African governement could breathe a sigh of relief, they were thrust onto the back foot again as a renowned media outlet announced that they would be sending D’Oliveira to South Africa to report on the Test series.
Shortly afterwards the MCC received a letter that threatened to blow up the aircraft that would carry the England squad to South Africa. The deal was off the cards.
But as the saying ‘fortune favours the brave’ goes, fate decided to side with Dolly yet again, as long-term friend and teammate Tom Cartwright withdrew from the tour due to a shoulder injury. The MCC, left with no further tricks, finally announced D’Oliveira as a replacement.
But Vorster would have none of it. On the very next day he sent out a press briefing stating, “We are not prepared to receive a team thrust upon us by people whose interests are not in the game but to gain certain political objectives which they do not even attempt to hide. The MCC team is not the team of the MCC but of the anti-apartheid movement”.
The roars of denunciation from all around the world fell on deaf ears of Vorster, who remained adamant, playing down the risk of even a potential exile from his own advisers.
A week later, the MCC met the representatives of the South African cricket board at Lord’s and rightly called off the tour. A year later South Africa found themselves exiled from all forms of international cricket for nearly 20 years.
D’Oliveira was no anti-apartheid rioter, nor did he even think of taking legal action against his perpetrators. He was just a simple, down-to-earth man who wanted to play the game. But he ended up playing a huge role in catalysing the two decades that South Africa spent as sporting outcasts and the ultimate abolishment of apartheid. For there should never have been normal sport in an abnormal country.
Nick
Guest
D'Oliveira was officially born in 1931 but he almost certainly misled people to strengthen his chances of selection for England. It's likely he was actually born in 1928. If so, he was aged 37 rather than 34 when he made his debut in 1966. His test career ended against Australia at The Oval in 1972 when he would have been approaching 44. His achievements can be seen to be even more remarkable in that light. Incidentally he played on for Worcestershire until 1980 even scoring a hundred against the touring Sri Lankans in 1979 when he was likely aged over 50.
Just Nuisance
Roar Rookie
Ironically that war in Afghanistan had a significant impact on proceedings . It deflected the Soviets involvement in the war in Southern Angola leading to them using Cubans to fight the war against SA/Unita as they were so tied up by the Afghan resistance. The Cubans turned out to be better soldiers more culturally aligned to the cause than expected . Put South Africans under huge pressure .But Mandela was wrong. The sporting boycott was nothing more than an inconvenience leading to spiteful reciprocal rebel tours in both rugby and cricket with bigger consequences for the touring countries including Australia than for SA itself ..What was Mandela to say ? That the sports boycotts were a waste of time ? ..I repeat it was very ordinary men and women in the streets of SA that changed the system ( and secured Mandela’s release ) often at great cost to themselves . And that’s exactly where the credit belongs .
Kalva
Roar Rookie
I think Mandela himself said that the sporting boycott had an impact...not the most impact but some impact. Let's not forget that there was already a sporting boycott on SA before 1968-69..in cricket, it was by WI, India and Pakistan but the SA govt didn't care as their teams still got to play the white nations. This incident changed things significantly. What's more and this is where it differs from the current issue with Afghanistan, one always had the feeling that the SA govt wanted acceptance from the relevant authorities of Aus, NZ and the UK. That's why they would go to great lengths to highlight what improvements to the minorities they were making to sport under the Apartheid system. The Taliban couldn't care less about this.
Insight Edge
Roar Rookie
Of course lots of truth in this statement too. Without the street protsts and uprisings it would have taken much much longer to dismantle apatheid. It is also true that England/GB/Australia rugby tours didn't break the SA off completly and the rebel tours of cricket. However, you must give credit to international efforts in particularly bring it to mass attention. The main point is that international disruption to SA government did cause issues that wouldn't go away. Ultimatley, as all ways, it was "people power" that won!! How many were they going to kill?
Just Nuisance
Roar Rookie
Its a romantic notion that this affair helped advance the demise of apartheid ..10 years of global sporting isolation all codes didn’t either , neither did blanket international economic and travel restrictions or ostracization help much . . Apartheid was ended by nondescript citizens marching in the streets , protesting and venting anger on every street corner . The trade unions particularly at the forefront pressurizing the corporates and govt to the negotiating table through mass marches and industry shutdowns. Sport , particularly cricket , domestically , actually thrived like never before or since in the absence of international competition . No apartheid didn’t end with free Mandela marches in London , Paris or New York or rock star concerts in Ireland. It was ended by the ordinary people I work with and interact with every single day of the week in our towns and cities , helped in no uncertain terms by the fall of the Berlin wall , alleviating white fears of communist rule . No disrespect intended to Basil D’Oliviera but he did at least still have a cricketing career . Countless other nameless cricketers of colour didn’t .
Kalva
Roar Rookie
I think he lied about his age..it was felt that he wouldn't have got as far as he did in England if they had known his real age.
Insight Edge
Roar Rookie
Yes, coach black kids to be exact so that he would be out of the way and "unavailable" for selection in the tour party!
Kalva
Roar Rookie
Yes after Cowdrey assured him that he would be in his team.
Kalva
Roar Rookie
He was offered money to coach in SA, not coach SA. Big difference…probably coach at a school
Insight Edge
Roar Rookie
Glad to have seen the great man play for England. He was a fearless batsman and the original "crissis" man. England were often 30/3 and "Dolly" would do his resue act time and again. He almost always got the hard/tough runs when it mattered. Also a very useful medium pacer and again, renowned partnership breaker! He fell victim to MCC selection committee playing underhand and buckling to SA pressure not to select him for the 1968/69 tour. There is a strong senses of opinion that his former captain Cowdry stabbed him in the back and agreed not to select him.
Insight Edge
Roar Rookie
The idea of getting Dolly a coaching job was real and its confirmed by him in his autobiographu. The deal was to get him out of the way so that he is "unavaliable" for the SA tour. However, it wasn't to be as a national coach as they didn't really exist back then. Dolly was to coach black/coloured kids in the "townships" not even white kids!
DaveJ
Roar Rookie
Nice article. But I find the idea that he was offered money to coach SA implausible. What’s the difference under apartheid between having a coloured person play for the opposition and have a coloured coach for the national team. To my knowledge, which is not negligible, this would have been even less acceptable in the 60s.
All day Roseville all day
Roar Guru
Small but very significant typo. He didn't leave SA until he was aged 29.
SDHoneymonster
Guest
And if you didn't know, England and South Africa compete for the Basil D'Oliveira Trophy when they play each other in Test cricket in honour of the great man.
All day Roseville all day
Roar Guru
Thanks Navid, I'm currently reading his autobiography, which was published in 1968 before these events. When he arrived in England at age 25 to play league cricket for Middleton, he didn't know how to bat on turf ! His cricket at home was played on matting. But he learned quickly and debuted for England six years later.
Navid Khan
Roar Rookie
Man that’s insightful! Gee. Thanks
Rowdy
Roar Rookie
The more things change the more they stay the same.
Rowdy
Roar Rookie
I've noticed that too in Fawlty Towers. But I'm a tragic. ------- Ep 6, Ser 1 & Ep 1, Ser 2 were the best episodes. Conny had divorced John between Series 1 (1975) & Series 2 (1979) ------- My best film spotting moment came in about 2000. The Two Cruises, Penelope and Tom, were crossing the same street as Bob Dylan and Suze Rotolo, in the same clothes, in the same direction with just about every vehicle being the same make and model. I think they got the Kombis wrong. This scene was on "The Freewheeling Bob Dylan" album cover.
sheek
Roar Guru
I’ve long believed the Saffies test cricket team of the mid to late 50s lacked both one batsman & one bowler, a dual role that would have been admirably filled by D’Oliveira. South Africa’s lamentable loss would prove to be England’s heroic gain. Prior to Australia arriving in 1957/58, the Saffies had played England in two enthralling series, losing 2-3 away & drawing 2-2 at home. The Saffies actually started favourites against Oz, but were blown away 0-4. They had a reasonably strong top 5 batting lineup: Derrick McGlew, Trevor Goddard, Wally Endean, Roy McLean & keeper John Waite. Skipper Clive van Ryneveld was a poor man’s all-rounder while Ken Funston wasn’t quite up to test standard. Tony Pithey, although already blooded, wasn’t used. The Saffies even had a stronger bowling attack of Neil Adcock, Peter Heine, Trevor Goddard & spinner Hugh Tayfield. Van Ryneveld wasn’t impressive as a 2nd spinner & paceman Ed Fuller & spinner Viv Smith were only given occasional tests. As I said, D’Oliveira would have solved both the #6 batting spot & 5th bowler dilemma. Here’s how the SA team of 1957/58 could have looked: D.McGlew (vc), T.Goddard, A.Pithey, W.Endean, R.McLean, B.D’Oliveira, J.Waite (wk), C.van Ryneveld (c), H.Tayfieid, P.Heine, N.Adcock. Presto, one heck of a competitive XI. The backups would have been: Ken Funston, John Nel, Ed Fuller, Viv Smith & Chris Duckworth (res wk). Not only would Dolly have added meat to the batting, coming in at #6 & moving Waite back to #7, but he also would have been the 5th bowler after Adcock, Heine, Goddard & Tayfield. In 1957 Dolly was aged 26, born in the same year 1931 as Goddard. Under different circumstances, both Goddard & D’Oliveira could have South Africa up to 15 years sound service, from circa 1955 to 70. I’ve read the story of Dolly’s omission, then selection, then abandonment of the 1968/69 tour. It reads like a script from the 3 Stooges or Keystone Cops or one of those 1930s slapstick comedy shows. By the time the MCC selection committee found their spine, it was too late. The sorry saga says nothing that is noble about any of those folk involved. They were spineless, gutless, & totally lacking in moral fibre. Their vacillation & obfuscation made it so easy for the SA govt to refuse the tour on grounds of political interference. A very sad saga indeed. Had they selected Dolly from the beginning, the SA govt may have found it difficult to ignore his selection on merit. But no…!
Mike Baldwin
Guest
Clearly the author has read Peter OBorne's biography of Dolly. Probably the best biography of a sportsman published in recent memory.