Eric Simons – Shadow Coach and Mystery Man

Sreelata YellamrazuFeb 11 2010

by Trevor Chesterfield

One of the more whimsical thoughts these days doing the rounds of the television and radio commentary boxes, and even the newspapers and websites is the metaphorical head-scratching when the name Eric Simons is mentioned. This is the man who India’s coach Gary Kirsten has entrusted to carry out duties as the team’s new bowling guru.

eric simons sudeep tyagi

And whatever way you view it, Simons’ title of ‘bowling consultant’ is just the fancy sobriquet to hide a multitude of pluses that Kirsten feels India need to pep up their pace and seam bowling attack, which has been described by some as ‘lacking a world class pedigree’. Now this in turn is a bit of cheek if it is recalled how they had Sri Lanka wrapped all too neatly around their bowling fingers in Kanpur and Mumbai. In this it is the Test bowling attack, not the limited-overs variety where games are so often won and lost because of the toss of a coin and the side is reduced to bowling second in conditions where luck, quality ground fielding and an ability to safely catch a bar of soap, is needed.

It indicates how the dew is in fact light precipitation being wept by the mythical angles feeling pity, or anguish - take your pick – at how the bowlers are reduced to appearing like extras making up a net practice to give the sloggers a chance to take aim and plunder freebie runs, boosting an average already distended by such favourable batting conditions, and improving a dodgy image as well.

Anyway, as the expression of “Eric Who?” resonated around the media centre of those covering the series in Bangladesh, many were scrambling through websites for info on the latest ‘shadow coach’ to emerge from the South African/Australian coterie. When it was pointed out he was the coach in charge of the South African team that was bundled out of the 2003 World Cup by misreading the simple Duckworth/Lewis formula at Kingsmead, Durban on another night the angels wept (this time for the locals, South Africa), the rupee or whatever coinage was in the pockets of those asking questions, eventually dropped.

‘Oh – that Eric,’ is the comment as it was all a matter of blink and you would have missed his career as a coach of South Africa; the man who replaced Graham Ford, jackknifed from the post by then United Cricket Board (of SA) administrators in such a gung-ho approach to get rid of him because they regarded his tenure as an abject failure after the horrific and politically smeared and scarred 2001/02 Tests with Australia where in six Tests, the Safs competed only once and won when it was too late and didn’t really matter. Yet anyone who examined that particular twin series and its failures should in reality blame the selectors, who were let-off with a pat on the back and a ‘well tried’ commendation. The only one who attempted to do anything sensible had been Mike Procter, now in the role of convener.

At the time, Ford’s dismissal had been organised through a well manipulated witch-hunt by certain selectors and administrators followed by a coerced public media flogging with a student dentist used to rip out an aching tooth and replacing it with a diseased one.

With no one really interested in filling the aching hole left by Ford’s unfair dismissal, (‘Eric Who?’) Simons earned the SA coaching post largely by default. Duncan Fletcher was rebuilding England, Bob Woolmer had a role as Africa development coaching consultant, Kepler Wessels had other interests and didn’t trust the system as such, especially the Percy Sonn/Ray Mali nexus, and instead of hawking the post the UCB gave it to someone whose credentials at provincial level were dodgy at best and they could also manoeuvre.

They didn’t want Ray Jennings, who although came ‘highly recommended’ and is an astute thinker of the game as well being the best man for the role, he is also one of the old school of discipline. For some his style is far too tough for the administrators, selectors and some of the soft players and to deal with.

Jennings career as a wicketkeeper/batsman for Transvaal was largely played in shadows of the apartheid inflicted isolation era. He has a waspish sense of humour along with a talent for noting quality as well as hewing skill from the most unlikely of candidates. He would have been ideal to whip the South African side back into mental shape; instead it lumbered along in a self-inflicted borderline personality disorder caused by the pernicious cricket politics of the day and it showed in some of the results.

At the same time as Procter became unavailable as selection panel convener because of his appointment with the International Cricket Council as a match referee, to suggest South Africa entered a darkened tunnel of uncertainty and direction is an accurate one.

All this left South Africa in a state of near rudderless identity, and as a former national convener of selectors once whispered on my ear, ‘With this man (Eric Who?) as coach, we are in for a serious rocky ride. From what I can see there is no genuine direction as he hasn’t a clue where the correct navigational aids are. Even if he did, he wouldn’t know how to use them to get the ship back on course.’ And from this, there was the impression, with South Africa less than a year away from the World Cup, there would be any number of problems.

His first task was an attempt to win the re-formatted Champions Trophy in Colombo seven months down the line and with a team that had to regroup. It was largely a ‘hit and miss’ operation with Simons relying seriously on the senior players to help him as he muddle through as best he could.

As he laconically explained after the tournament where South Africa lost the semi-final to India after the Lance Klusener magic failed, ‘Coaching at international level is so different to your domestic set up. There is no comfort zone.’ Well said. Almost suggesting the truism of how you can’t forget yesterday – it happened, and sadly all the disasters with it.

With two soft home Test series and limited overs tournaments against a willing but outplayed Sri Lanka followed by your typically dysfunctional Pakistan tourists, South Africa had high hopes for becoming the first host nation to win the World Cup. Instead, the tournament became an embarrassment from the start, and at a crucial stage of the must win game against Sri Lanka at Kingsmead, Simons misread the not so fine print on the Duckworth/Lewis calculation sheet. It gave the impression how the whole coaching operation had become a malfunctioning joke.

In the immediate aftermath of the Kingsmead game, it was Pollock, not Simons, who took the brunt of the flak from the media during the noisy post match conference. The invitation to the Super Sixes and the remainder of the tournament was crumpled, along with the D/L script, and tossed in bin for wastepaper along with other unnecessary paraphernalia.

Players though later said how they had been stunned at the way Simons conducted the whole D/L operation during the late stages of the game as Sri Lanka, already qualified stayed on the field for as long as possible in heavy rain to give South Africa a chance to also qualify. From theses comments, there has long been the impression Simons had a different agenda to the clear-thinking Pollock. According to one dressing room eyewitness, Simons also seemed to groping for answers and totally out of his depth in such a pressure cooker environment.

After the game, Simons switched off his UCB mobile number, using instead a private one. When his UCB number was later in use, he refused to take calls from those whose numbers were not in his list of contacts. As it transpires, says a source, Simons failed to present Pollock’s views and other comments to Omar Henry on the whole CWC03 debacle. Henry (then convener of selectors), the rest of the selection panel as well as senior UCB executive members who were at an inquest in Cape Town two days later to discuss reasons for South Africa failing to qualify for the second phase. Pollock had a long-standing prior engagement and Simons and Henry knew about this. But on the following Friday after the Kingsmead game Pollock met Henry and other selectors for a second meeting.

Late that Friday, a laconic SAS text message sent by a source close to Pollock and certain members of the South African side, said ‘Pollock has been sacked as captain - bad show, more later’. The ‘later’ was a call from the confidant thirty minutes afterwards, confirming Pollock’s dismissal as captain. It gave the Indian Express an international scoop as the inquest of South Africa’s untimely ejection from their own party became more factious by the hour with a series of counter allegations and a particular Durban sports writer of some disrepute, claiming Pollock had walked out of the meeting, which he later denied.

Pollock agreed to step down, advocating his support for Graeme Smith, named as the new captain, and how the lucky Simons preened – his position was safe as the miffed nation grumbled over the demise of the World Cup hopes. Eighteen months later, after a dismal 1-0 series defeat in Sri Lanka and a poor limited overs performance, Simons was finally axed and for the India tour, Jennings took over on a temporary basis.

When he began his Currie Cup and provincial slogs career in 1984/85, Simons was based in Pretoria doing a two-year military stint in the air force as part of the compulsory military service required by the apartheid state. It was his bowling and batting at an unpretentious venue known as Berea Park which saw him make a name for himself as a 21-year-old. A remarkable all-round performance in a Currie Cup semi-final against his old team, Western Province did much to help Northern Transvaal reach the final for the first time and carve a reputation for himself.

It didn’t last. He was overtaken by other, better bowlers and his international career was as erratic as his form and as with his international coaching stint, over before making an impression. All of which suggests how trying to teach Indians to bowl in their own conditions is like asking a foreign chef to do a tandoori chicken without local ingredients. How would he know what is the right length? Ah well, watch this space.

Note: Prior permission has sought from the author before republication of the above article.

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