People keep hinting at some reason why Tsotsobe isn't in the squad. What did he do?
A lot of people have spoken about his attitude citing Warriors, Dolphins & Essex. He moved from Warriors to Dolphins abruptly, which coincided with Klusener's arrival as coach there. Aggrieved at losing him Warriors had nasty things to say, and Klusener had nasty things to say about him too when he left for Lions from Dolphins. Most Africans want to come live&work in Gauteng. He's no different.
Many contracted national players have used their privilege to switch sides out of the blue with no hussle, but too much was made of Tsotsobe. As for Essex, there's lot of Black players who've played club cricket in England (from Zimbabwe&Kenya). Like Tsotsobe they've complained about the treatment they received while there. The only difference is that in these instances Tsotsobe had a big profile and his franchises maybe felt he must be a good loyal boy and do what he's told, not take advantage of his profile and do&speak as he pleases like other fellow professionals do. he doesn't have that right.
So clearly the resons are deeper.
This is not a current problem it's old actually and I think it's not about what Tsotsobe did, it's about who Tsotsobe is. The same reason Ntini was denied the 400 wickets milestone, while inferior players were chosen ahead of him, or players with worse form toda than he had when he was pushed out, is the same reason Tsotsobe has been cosistently sabotaged without reason. That reason is envy!
He was inexplicably
dropped for Rory Kleinveldt for the Test tour to Australia in late 2012. That's a decision which took a lot of people by surprise including Tsotsobe. This is what Hudson had to say:
"It is tough luck for Lopsy (Lonwabo Tsotsobe) to miss out but we just feel that Rory's ability to hit the deck hard will give us a valuable option, particularly at Brisbane and Perth," convenor of selectors Andrew Hudson said.
A very very very stupid reason given by Hudson considering Rory had never in his career ever looked remotely close to as good as Tsotsobe whose Test career was just starting.
The comments at the bottom of that article were interesting too, but again no one has anything concrete why he was left out then as with now:
POSTED BY Clan_McLachlan on | October 10, 2012, 13:54 GMT
An interesting selection. I think that Tsotsobe deserves more chances in Tests, but he hasn't helped himself with a bad attitude.
POSTED BY S.Jagernath on | October 12, 2012, 21:26 GMT
Do the selectors really believe that Thami Tsolekile is a better choice than Dane Vilas,Morne Van Wyk or Heino Kuhn.Rory Kleinveldt is a good selection though Lonwabo Tsotsobe didn't actually do anything wrong.
Rory was a disaster. But I'm confident Tsotsobe would've gone to AUS and taken advantage of those wickets to cememnt his place in the Test side. They didn't want that to happen.
Many guys have bad attitudes, but they've played tons of internationals games and they are legends today. People make Tsotsobe seem like a Jesse Ryder, Warner etc when that's not the case at all.
Tsotsobe recovered in time to have gone to NZ&AUS, then played against WI but they made sure that didn't happen. He kept being overlooked. Instead they kept selecting players whom they knew wouldn't be selected for the final CWC.
One of those was Abbott. No one in their right mind would've said Abbott over Tsotsobe but it happened, despite his shocking record & form in the lead up.
Again we had an injured keeper who was also and opener, but we selected a middle order batsman Rilee & Morne van Wyk, all of them ahead of a top specialist young opener with a great future (reeza Hendricks), when we knew QdK would go to the CWC and be given time to recover while AB keeps. At the end of the day we had RR opening, and AB keeping, while RR kept failing dismally because that's not his role. Eventually he played down the order.
What's the result?
1. MvW is at home;
2. RR is scratching his backside because he failed opening and the middle order is well covered with JP who can bowl now back&recovered;
3. QdK is playing but off form just as he was before injury;
4. A world class seamer is sitting at home doing commentary in between - Lonwabo Tsotsobe;
5. A competent specialist opener is also sitting at home while pasting domestic attack in between - Reeza Hendricks; and most importantly;
6. Our seam attack stinks and there's no better solution; while our opening pair is a very weak link and again there's no solution!
In a nutshell if Tsotsobe&Reeza were white, they'd be at the CWC.
I'm entitled to think that way because no one is giving the right reasons. Hudson, the selectors and coaches need to give reasons publicly. All other professional organisations do. We've seen it with other players in cricket, rugby & soccer. Where Tsotsobe is concerned, the only thing are unsubstantiated rumours, while those who spread those rumours never stop to ask themsevels why an official position hasn't been adopted.
Thami Tsolekile was messed around dropped, then removed form the central contracts with no reasons given and a lying administratio which couldn;t keep its word. Now that's gross unprofessionalism but people won't complain becaus ethey don't like Thami, but that's worse than the noise Warriors made when Tsotsobe left them without proper communication.
How do you hold something against Tsotsobe, but not those in charge of an entire system?
At the end of the day
the most high profile non-white legends we,ve had in South Africa have been mistreated - Makhaya Ntini, Chester Williams, and now Lonwabo Tsotsobe. Unsubstantiated rumours or silly reasons have been given each time. If you have concrete reasons there's no need to tip toe on the matter, and wait for the autobiographies of Gibbs, Williams, then later Ntini&Tsotsobe to come before the reasons officials should've given years before.
The fact of the matter is, Tsotsobe is under a Black coach at the Lions
Geoffrey Toyana who will be a Proteas coach, and he's happy there, plays very well and no one complains about him.
While coaches have crazy things to say about him, what we've seen while watching him is completely different and the
journalists have reported accordingly:
Lonwabo Tsotsobe is under no illusions. He knows he will not play in the third Test against England at Lord's unless there is an injury. But it did not stop him from running in faster than he has done in recent memory, bowling at a better pace or conducting himself as though he was on trial.
"We've got 15 good players in our squad and you just wait for your chance and take it with both hands. I am always ready to take the chance," Tsotsobe said after the drawn tour match against Derbyshire. Before Vernon Philander was picked, Tsotosbe was the third seamer in the Test side and he had not disgraced himself in that role. He took the wickets of Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid and MS Dhoni in the Test match in Durban and was building a reputation as a giant slayer of sorts.
Tsotsobe was not spoken about in the same way as someone like Marchant de Lange, who made an impact months later against the touring Australians, because he was not nearly as quick. Qualities such as subtlety are often underappreciated but it was what Tsotsobe used to his advantage.
Just read the interesting comments from neutrals. Again no one in their right mind would pick Rory ahead of him, but Hudson did.
Yes this belongs in that other our team thread, but you asked and I responded. In Bafana Bafana Shakes Mashaba only needs 24-48 hours to explain why even the most fringe player has been overlooked. But a top player would never be excluded for long like Tsotsobe with no reasons given. Now we wait for the rumour-mongers and hopefully the officials will back up their rumours when the Proteas return. They had better win the damn thing if they don't want to answer these questions because we'll be demanding concrete answers.
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