Why South Africa should give up picking players based on the racial quota system

Kevin Pietersen: Best example for South Africa’s loss proving to be England’s gain

South Africa continued to carry the “chokers” tag after failing to cross the semi-final hurdle for the fourth time in their history at the 2015 World Cup. However, despite that loss, another bit of news that created bigger headlines after the game was regarding the inclusion of fast bowler Vernon Philander in the team for the game against the Kiwis, at the expense of an impressive Kyle Abbott.

The decision to include Philander was taken after South African cricket's governing body insisted that a black player should be picked in the side. That demand from the board clearly didn't go down well with their captain AB de Villiers, who threatened to pull out of the encounter at one point.

The racial quota system has been an epidemic in South African cricket and it has robbed them of several extremely talented players, who have been forced to move on to other countries in search of better opportunities.

Prominent examples of players taking up different avenues to succeed

New Zealand batsman Grant Elliott will go down in the country's history as being the cricketer who scored the winning six that guided them to a historic maiden appearance in a World Cup final. But did you know that the 36-year-old was born in Johannesburg and the captain of Gauteng, the domestic side that Elliott played for in 1996-97, Ken Rutherford suggested he move to a different country in order to get more chances as he might get blocked by the quota system in South Africa?

Elliott, though isn't the only example of a player moving on to a different country in search of a better opportunity to realise his dreams.

One of the most established examples of a player falling prey to this system was England's Kevin Pietersen. The right-hander was among the first to switch to another country after he wasn't considered in the KwaZulu Natal's first team in 1999 as according to the system at least 4 black players had to be present in every domestic team in the country and hence despite putting up a commendable performance against a touring England side that year, he wasn't selected in the playing XI.

The 34-year-old was clearly not happy at being dropped for the first XI, and categorically stated that players must picked on merit and not based on colour and ever since then has always been critical of the system.

“I was dropped because the quota system was brought into South African cricket to positively discriminate in favour of 'players of colour' and to fast-track the racial integration of cricket in the country.

“To me, every single person in this world needs to be treated exactly the same and that should have included me, as a promising 20-year-old cricketer. If you do well you should play on merit. That goes for any person of any colour. It was heartbreaking.”

- Kevin Pietersen, back in 2006

He, then, made a shift to England in search of a better chance to realize his dreams and after an initial struggle, got the opportunity that he was looking for.

That shift from South Africa to England, proved to be the latter's gain, as Pietersen played a pivotal role in helping them win their first Ashes in almost 2 decades by playing an exceptional counter-attacking innings of 158 at the Oval in 2005 and following that effort, established himself as one of the backbone of the England batting unit for the next few years.

Pietersen, though, isn't the only South African-born cricketer who made the switch from the African nation to England. Another promising batsman and a future teammate of the right-hander, Jonathan Trott also made the switch to England in 2002 despite being born and raised in South Africa and representing South Africa's domestic side Boland in 2000 as well as the Western province in 2001. Trott emerged as one of England's best batsman, scoring hundreds in different parts of the world, ever since debuting in 2009.

Make talent primary, everything else secondary

The above examples makes one thing crystal clear to everybody: Colour isn't a determinant to how good a player you actually are, but talent and ability is.

While South African cricket may have their own reasons behind the racial quota system, they must realize that players in today's times have a lot more avenues and hence can take the option of representing other countries and live their dreams and so, in order to avoid losing out on any more talented young cricketers, they must resort back to taking talent into consideration first and then everything else.