South African coach regrets his choice of words, but shows no intent to apologize on 'grovel' remark
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Just a week and a half after Shukri Conrad, the South African coach, had said that he wants India to 'grovel,' he explains his intention and regrets his choice of words to express a completely different mindset. However, he had added that this has turned the India vs South Africa series spicy.
Following South Africa's promising show in the two Tests, some vile remarks from their coach towards the Indian contingent had made him look like a villain in terms of the game. But after the ODI defeat, the coach opted to clarify what he implied with his words, but did not choose to apologize.
Had this not been clarified, this matter could have been exaggerated to a huge extent, especially considering BCCI's influence in World cricket, which Cricket South Africa (CSA) had already witnessed back in 2013.
"I could have chosen a better word," the South African coach regrets his choice of words
After the ODI series hammering, though not a whitewash for South Africa, the coach, Shukri Conrad, finally chose to explain his choice of words when he had earlier claimed that they wanted to grovel to the Indians.
The term "grovel" is one of the most disrespectful and is associated with heinous terms like "slavery" and "racism." In cricket, this term is found associated with merciless bullying, since England Captain Tony Greig was the first to use it against the West Indies in 1976, which led to the formation of the West Indies killing machine, that is, their lethal pace bowling deck.
"It was never my intention to cause any malice or not be humble about anything," Conrad told a press conference in Visakhapatnam on Saturday. "I could have chosen a better word, on reflection, because it left it open to people putting their own context to it.
"The only context I intended it to be was for India to spend a lot of time [in the field] and make it really tough for them. I've got to be careful what word I use here now because context could be attached to that as well!" he added.
"Maybe what it did do was spice up the ODI series," Conrad said on his merciless tone used during the Guwahati press conference
From what Conrad had previously said during the Guwahati Test, he took a learning and claimed that his choice of words might have made it look wrong, but his intention was only to spice up the contest.
"It's really a pity," Conrad continued on Saturday. "Maybe what it did do was spice up the ODI series, and especially with [India] winning that now, the T20 series becomes even more [spicy].
"The unfortunate thing is, with all the noise that word caused, I still think it's a perfectly good English word. But it left it open to too many interpretations."
"We would have wanted to make it a lot more exciting today," claimed Temba Bavuma
Quinton de Kock's opening century, his seventh against India, went in vain, as Prasidh Krishna and then Kuldeep Yadav bound the Protea batters with shackles, as India was handed a target of just 271 runs. With the inform Indian batting unit and the dew factor in favour of batting, this seemed to be a cakewalk for the Men in Blue batters.
Yashasvi Jaiswal, who has been scanty of runs in the series, finally got his eye on the ball, and despite a struggling start against the left-handed Marco Jansen, he survived and then scored an unbeaten maiden hundred to lead India to a massive 9-wicket victory alongside half-centuries from veterans Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.
"We would have wanted to make it a lot more exciting today," Bavuma told the host broadcaster. "From a batting point of view, we didn't have enough runs. It tends to get easier under lights, and we should have been smarter - we gifted wickets."
He further added that though South Africa lost the series, they took away several positives from the series. The skipper believed that his team had grown, and despite India being such a strong team, South Africa managed to put them under pressure on several occasions in the series. "I think if there were 10 boxes, we ticked six or seven of them," concluded Bavuma.
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India National Cricket Team South Africa National Cricket Team India vs South Africa South Africa vs India Shukri Conrad Temba Bavuma BCCI Cricket South Africa (CSA)About the Author
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