Up to Kolpak players to comeback into system and play for South Africa, states Graeme Smith

Up to Kolpak players to comeback into system and play for South Africa, states Graeme Smith

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Graeme Smith has revealed that once Kolpak gets over, the South African players will have to make an attempt to make a comeback to the national team by returning to the country's domestic system. Smith further admitted that the management are not keen on excluding certain players from the system.

The end of the Kolpak deal offers Cricket South Africa (CSA) a chance to recall some of their stars into the national team setup. CSA’s director of cricket, Graeme Smith revealed that with no more Kolpak deals, it is an opportunity for an injection of much-needed experience onto the domestic circuit. He added that it is up to these players to force a comeback to the national team on the back of good performances. 

“With Kolpak coming to an end, I guess the willingness is always to have our best players in the system. It is up to the players to come back into the system and to make decisions on their careers,” said Smith, reported India Today. 

A host of players would be available to force themselves for a national-team comeback. One of the top names on that list is Essex’s Simon Harmer, who has the reputation for being one of the best off-spinners in the world. Smith revealed that he would love to see the players partake in domestic cricket in the country and added that the board does not want to exclude any players from the system.

“From our perspective, we want to encourage all our best players to play here domestically, and then give themselves the opportunity to be selected for the national side. We don’t ever want to exclude players from being part of our system and we understand that the landscape of the world game is very different now to what it was,” he added. 

“Open minds and how we look at these things is going to be key to how we keep our best players. How we keep them motivated and in our game,” he concluded. 

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