Leave the baby in the bath

It was quite an irony reading cricket colleague Neil Manthorp suggesting that a cure for the disappointment of the VB Series result might be to switch our attentions to the start of the Super 14 season.

Those were precisely the thoughts that crossed my mind when Charl Langeveldt’s dismissal signalled the end of my summer past-time of sweating in front of the television watching our men in green (and of course white when they play in test matches, which is my preferred version of the game).

Unlike last season, when I felt quite bereft once the English had left our shores following a titanic series, there is some relief in the thought that at least I don’t have to sit through any more of Ian Chappell telling us what is wrong with South African cricket.

But if Neil feels that the Super 14 may usher in a breath of fresh air and make us feel we are living in a ripened pomegranate following the sour grape-fruit of the past couple of weeks, my only advice to him is that I hope he enjoys the freshness. For if history is anything to go by, it isn’t going to last!

If the South African team’s bomb early and throw up the white flag of surrender, as the Stormers did at roughly the halfway mark in 2005, this year’s competition, with it’s extra games, is really going to test the long-sufferers to the limits of their endurance.

It all starts this weekend, the second weekend of February, and it ends at the end of May – which ironically, is almost the length of any clever long-distance runner’s buildup to the Comrades Marathon.

If you disagree with me, look at the dates, and then consult running guru Norrie Williamson’s guide to running Comrades. He reckons that you should only start focussing on Comrades at the beginning of March, two weeks after the start of the Super 14, and of course the race takes place on June 16, which is roughly two weeks after the Super 14 final.

If you read all of that carefully, you should understand what I am getting at. In short (which of course it isn’t, because my point is that it is lo-o-o-o-ng), the road to decision day in the Super 14 is roughly the same length as the road to the Comrades finish.

This is apt, for if there is one thing we can be sure of about this year’s Super 14, it is that the extra games are going to have to require the same adjustment from teams as those made by long-distance runners when they move up from the standard marathon distance to the ultra-marathon.

In previous seasons we have seen teams battle early on and lose up to three games in the initial stages and yet still come back to contest the finals. Now that there are 14 teams chasing the prize, it stands to reason that you could lose even more games early on and still be there competing at the finish if you pace yourself and leave some gas in the tank.

So while there is going to be a lot of intensity early on, those of us who are watching the tournament might be wise not to read too much into what happens in the early stages. This year’s tournament is going to be a survival course, and those who come out of the blocks too fast might just find themselves crawling when we reach the Super 14 equivalent of the last big hill on the up Comrades, Polly Shortts.

With relegation hovering in the background, there is a lot riding on the competition this year for South African teams. Inevitably, because it is almost the definition of the sports media’s job, the early results are going to prompt premature analysis of where everyone stands, and where everyone is going.

It’s what everyone wants to know, and the teams that lose this week are going to be said to be under intense pressure. But the players and the coaches should try and ignore all of that. They may recall that last year no-one gave the Bulls a chance when they lost early games, first at Ellis Park to the Cats and then overseas. Yet they recovered well to make the semi-finals.

This year the slow starters have even longer to start finding momentum. If they stay calm, and refuse to throw out the baby with the bath-water, they might just do that.

Maybe the Super 14 teams should take a cue from Australia’s approach to the VB Series. In the words of Bill Lawry, the fellows in the canary colours are only really “on fire” now. They lost early games but didn’t let it bother them for they knew it was a long road.

The message to those team’s that falter in the opening week of the Super 14 should be that to panic after the opening round of a 16 week tournament will have the sure result of leaving them feeling pretty much like Graeme Smith must be feeling right now.