Peter Roebuck

[Langeveldt]

He is very complimentary towards SA and what they've accomplished. Why didn't you like it?

We've had a crap few hundred years, granted, and nobody can or ever will forget what happened.. But we could do without hearing about all the time like we've just come out of a war or something.. One shudders to think what he would come up with if he was asked to report on the German soccer team, after all, it's only sixty five years since Auschwitz.. Roebuck was in England during the State of Emergency IIRC, and now he's waxing lyrical about how far SA has come as if he was on the front lines..

 

[Langeveldt]

Because everything Roebuck writes is laden with pretentious socio-political overtones and an insufferable sense of self-importance. He seems to write like a war journalist. It's just a bloody sport. "The Road out of Hell"? It's not the holocaust survivors we're talking about, FFS, it's just a game of cricket. It's annoying hyperbole.

This

 

[four_or_six]

Cricinfo - Time to put the boot in

Could have been such a good article, but no Roebuck was writing it. Here we are trying to celebrate arguable the best South African side of all time, and all Roebuck wants to talk about are Whites, Blacks, Coloured people, Indians and Rooinekke.. I imagine being with him must be like taking a black girlfriend back to a conservative set of grandparents

Agreed, for a main article on cricinfo it's a shame there's little actual cricket in it.

 

[Richard]

Cricinfo - Time to put the boot in

Could have been such a good article, but no Roebuck was writing it. Here we are trying to celebrate arguable the best South African side of all time, and all Roebuck wants to talk about are Whites, Blacks, Coloured people, Indians and Rooinekke.. I imagine being with him must be like taking a black girlfriend back to a conservative set of grandparents

I can't see any argument that this is the best SA side ever. No chance. As I say, I'd be very confident it's not even the best since readmission.

 

[Langeveldt]

I can't see any argument that this is the best SA side ever. No chance. As I say, I'd be very confident it's not even the best since readmission.

Judged by our performances rather than the inviduals involved in the team, I'd say you were wrong..

 

[Richard]

Performances (ie, team results) aren't all there is to it. These depend as much on the opposition as one's own team.

Just because the SA team of 2008/09 has won in Australia where earlier ones didn't doesn't automatically mean they're better.

 

[Briony]

Performances (ie, team results) aren't all there is to it. These depend as much on the opposition as one's own team.

Just because the SA team of 2008/09 has won in Australia where earlier ones didn't doesn't automatically mean they're better.

I think it's one of the more solid batting units they've produced. Since isolation, they've had some good teams with good bowling outfits but especially in the early years they lacked a bit of class and reliability on the batting front.

 

[wpdavid]

It's poor alright. Much of it seems to derive from Roebuck's habitual resentment towards anyone who beats Australia, and the comparison with England in 2006/7 to the current SA situation is laughable. As for the essay on SA's past, there's been much better stuff written elsewhere, and this adds nothing. It is, as others have said, irrelevant at this point in time.

The question about whether this is SA's best ever side is an interesting one. My gut feeling is that the mid90's outfit was a tougher XI simply because they were older and therefore more experienced. Obv the fact that they failed to beat that generation of Australians isn't entirely relevant. I might hold a different view in a couple of years time though. As for the 1970 side, it's so hard to say much about their test performances. Ultimately, seeing off a declining & knackered Aus side isn't enough to take them to the 'untouchable' level that some would have us believe, even if it was 4-0.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

I remember one of my classmates getting caned at a regular state primary school aged about six. That would be 1987 I think.

Jeez, looks like I only escaped it by a couple of years!

It wasn't compulsory. You had to really annoy the hell out a teacher before they would resort to........................................... looks like you only escaped by a couple of years.

 

[Briony]

It's poor alright. Much of it seems to derive from Roebuck's habitual resentment towards anyone who beats Australia, and the comparison with England in 2006/7 to the current SA situation is laughable. As for the essay on SA's past, there's been much better stuff written elsewhere, and this adds nothing. It is, as others have said, irrelevant at this point in time.

The question about whether this is SA's best ever side is an interesting one. My gut feeling is that the mid90's outfit was a tougher XI simply because they were older and therefore more experienced. Obv the fact that they failed to beat that generation of Australians isn't entirely relevant. I might hold a different view in a couple of years time though. As for the 1970 side, it's so hard to say much about their test performances. Ultimately, seeing off a declining & knackered Aus side isn't enough to take them to the 'untouchable' level that some would have us believe, even if it was 4-0.

Agree about the last point, the Aussie team of that time was not the greatest, especially in the bowling department which was between eras and they had come off an arduous tour of India.

 

[Langeveldt]

Peter Roebuck - Lets write a piece about South Africa and how amazing it is that the blacks and whites don't want to tear each others faces off.. Isn't that amazing? Let's write about it and be patronising EVERY SINGLE WEEK. I wonder what he is going to write when Jacob Zuma turns our beautiful multi-racial land of milk and honey into the next Zimbabwe?

Cricinfo - South Africa's hour

 

[Briony]

I don't know if Zuma can be any worse than Mbeki and his "HIV doesn't cause AIDs" and general resentment towards the white people. At least Zuma believes the Afrikaners are true South Africans, even if he doesn't see the British descended whites as such. In any case I've been hearing for the past decade that SA is the new Zimbabwe. Every country has its problems but SA folk seem to whinge more than others.

 

[Langeveldt]

I don't know if Zuma can be any worse than Mbeki and his "HIV doesn't cause AIDs" and general resentment towards the white people. At least Zuma believes the Afrikaners are true South Africans, even if he doesn't see the British descended whites as such. In any case I've been hearing for the past decade that SA is the new Zimbabwe. Every country has its problems but SA folk seem to whinge more than others.

Sorry, wrong thread really.. We see him as a lose cannon who can do no good really, his ANC cronies are as corrupt as Mugabe's and brainwash the uneducated masses into believing that they can provide a better future and a vote for anyone else means we'll end up back in Apartheid again. Mbeki was useless, but did preside over a huge amount of economic growth for all here, what will happen to our reputation in terms of investors when Zuma arrives with his five wives and *** with an HIV positive woman mentality?.. They ANC have served their purpose with Mandela, now we need an alternative to stop our slide towards being just another Banana republic like the rest of them..

 

[Briony]

I agree that you need a viable alternative to the ANC but I can't see the majority voting them out. But many countries effectively have a one, or at best two party system which is a recipe for corruption.

 

[Langeveldt]

I agree that you need a viable alternative to the ANC but I can't see the majority voting them out. But many countries effectively have a one, or at best two party system which is a recipe for corruption.

If he gets below 66.7% then he cannot change the constitution which effectively doesn't allow him to do much.. That is the hope amongst most educated people in SA.. And if he actually delivers on his talk he will actually be a very good president.. Mind you, even though I speak Afrikaans, play for an Afrikaans cricket club and pay my taxes, I'm not black/Afrikaans enough to matter, and it sucks that he's even bringing racial groups into it..

 

[wpdavid]

I can't see any argument that this is the best SA side ever. No chance. As I say, I'd be very confident it's not even the best since readmission.

Looks sounder than ever now we're the other side of the series in SA. If nothing else, I'd have to take SA's opening attack in the 1990's ahead of the current guys. At present, anyway.

 

[Evermind]

I think Roebuck is a closet nazi and doesn't want to admit it to himself, like the way closet homosexuals don't want to admit to their ***uality. No way is he not obsessed over race and conflicted about it - he writes about it incessantly. I can't think of any other reason.

 

[oitoitoi]

I don't know about that, he was very friendly with the Indians last time they were in Australia. Personally the only problem I have with Roebuck is that his tone is often patronising and that he seems to write in hindsight far too much.

Regarding Zuma, the man's ridiculously corrupt, more Winni Mandela than Nelson. Didn't he actually try to get rid of the elite anti-corruption unit? I hate most politicians on principal but Zuma is one of those who has his own special little pedestal of filth.

 

[Corli]

Peter Roebuck - Lets write a piece about South Africa and how amazing it is that the blacks and whites don't want to tear each others faces off.. Isn't that amazing? Let's write about it and be patronising EVERY SINGLE WEEK. I wonder what he is going to write when Jacob Zuma turns our beautiful multi-racial land of milk and honey into the next Zimbabwe?

Cricinfo - South Africa's hour

Completely agree. I started to read the article this morning, thinking it couldn't possibly be about race and politics again, because surely he's covered that issue by now. But no.

Regarding Zuma, I'm glad that there are no elections posters with his face on on my daily route, because just seeing him makes me angry.

 

[zaremba]

Personally the only problem I have with Roebuck is that his tone is often patronising and that he seems to write in hindsight far too much.

I agree about his patronising / self-satisfied tone.

His fondness for spanking teenage boys also puts me off him a little bit.