Didn’t even know how much five crore was: Rabada.

South Africa’s Kagiso Rabada, left, reacts with teammates as England’s
Jason Roy loses his wicket during the T20 cricket match
between South Africa and England in
Cape Town, South Africa, Friday, Feb. 19, 2016. | AP

CHENNAI: November 5, 2014. AS JP Duminy walks out with the teamsheet ahead of a T20I in Adelaide, a seminal moment in the history of South African cricket is being played out. Not many, though, latch on to the fact.

There are three debutants in the visiting team but it’s the third of the three that’s responsible for the watershed moment — Kagiso Rabada, South Africa’s first ‘born free’ cricketer.

It was a big deal not only because of the attached symbolism — “someone born in a country after its transition to democracy (in particular post-apartheid South Africa or post-independence Zimbabwe),” is how the Oxford dictionary describes the phrase. But what it meant from a sporting perspective.
There had been a radical shift towards introducing quotas in various sports as part of the transformation goals. A few commentators called this process ‘reverse racism’. Merit being sacrificed to conform to policies to right the wrongs carried out during aparthied.



By Swaroop Swaminathan.
Full story at New Indian Express.