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Symcox's June 7 testimony

EXAMINATION BY MR FITZGERALD: Mr Symcox, if I can start with some background information. Is it correct that you first represented South Africa, the National side, in 1993?

MR SYMCOX: Yes.

MR FITZGERALD: You retired from international cricket, I understand, in May 1998.

MR SYMCOX: That's correct.

MR FITZGERALD: And you retired from representative cricket during the 1999/2000 cricket season.

MR SYMCOX: Yes, that's correct.

MR FITZGERALD: I understand, and this rather dates you, you started your cricket career in Kimberley in 1977 for Griqualand West.

MR SYMCOX: That's correct, as well.

COMMISSIONER: You say that dates him, do you? (laughs)

MR FITZGERALD: And you were a regular member of the South African National side during the period 1993 to 1998.

MR SYMCOX: Yes.

MR FITZGERALD: And you were involved both in Test Series, both in South Africa and abroad.

MR SYMCOX: Yes.

MR FITZGERALD: You represented our country both in Test matches and One-day Internationals.

MR SYMCOX: Yes.

MR FITZGERALD: Your current employment is what?

MR SYMCOX: I work for myself, on the one hand, and I'm also contracted to Super Sport, which is broadcasting and doing a television show every now and again.

MR FITZGERALD: May I before, I proceed, just hand up to you, and then to the COMMISSIONER, a copy of your statement which you signed? Will you just confirm - sorry, first to Mr Symcox. Can you just identify your signature on the last page? That is your statement and you confirm the contents of that statement.

MR SYMCOX: Yes, I've signed it so I'm - it is mine.

COMMISSIONER: Do you have a copy for me, Mr Fitzgerald?

MR FITZGERALD: That is your copy, Mr COMMISSIONER.

COMMISSIONER: Oh, I see, that's mine.

MR FITZGERALD: Mr Symcox, may we begin with what I think is now commonly known as the 1996 offer that was made to the South African team? Can you describe to the COMMISSIONER what in fact happened, and in doing so also have regard to the context. And perhaps we can start by putting the offer in context with particular regard to the time of the tour and the nature of the tour.

MR SYMCOX: Okay. The 1996 tour, which I was a member of, was probably, of all the tours that I've been on, and I'm - was the most difficult tour from a circumstantial point of view. We were going into unknown territory in India, on tough wickets, and against a good opposition at home. And we ended up losing a Test Series, up front, and then got involved in a One-day Series, which meant we travelled quite a lot around India.

Now the whole travel programme and fixtures were based on moving us around the country as much as possible, at as early in the morning as possible, and arriving as late as possible without the cleanest of buses. And having the worst practise facilities as well, at times with clothes and sometimes without, that had got lost.

So the tour was a really, really tough tour. It was, for me, one of the first times that we'd experienced playing at places like Eden Gardens, with 100 000 people, and the Bombay's of the world. And the conditions very foreign. Obviously under the food problems that one experiences and the water problems, and people getting sick. So it was a really tough, tough tour.

And we got to the point in the tour where, like all tough tours, at the end of the tour the resistance of people are down. People are feeling sick; people want to go home; you've lost the Series, there's really nothing in it; and it just - everybody seems to spiral down to a slow grind of going home.

The last game of the tour was to be Mahindah Armenath's Benefit Match, which we'd agreed to via the United Cricket Board. And then at a late stage in the tour, they changed it to become a One-day Test, an official One-day Test, which we were unhappy about, because at that stage we felt we were playing a One-day Test under the wrong circumstances. Also, what was upsetting was it was Hansie's hundredth time he would play for South Africa, and if they didn't make that a One-day Test, he would then be able to play his hundredth one the following season, which was the first game in Bloemfontein, in front of his home crowd. And so he was upset as well, that it was done so by the UCB.

But nevertheless, we were on tour and we got stuck in and got involved. And prior to the start of the game, or the day of the play, we attended a meeting in Hansie's room. He asked the players to come to the room. There were no Management involved, and he put it to us that he had received an offer on behalf of the team, if we were interested in losing the match.

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