EXCLUSIVE: Kaizer Motaung Junior hangs up his boots: but is this son of a legend the future of South African football?

Runs in the family: Kaizer Motaung Junior

Kaizer Motaung Junior is NOT going to rely on his surname to secure a future for himself in South African football.


In his first full interview since he retired from the game this week, the 32-year-old opened his heart on my football show BOLLOCKZ! on www.ballz.co.za, insisting: "It's no good having the right surname if you haven't got the right qualifications.

"Just like it was on the football field, I have to fight for my place at Kaizer Chiefs, for my future. I want to get my degree, it was always difficult studying and playing, I want to put something back in the game."

Motaung, whose father set up South Africa's biggest footballing franchise Kaizer Chiefs after a glittering career in the USA in the early 1970s, will link up with his sister Jessica to ensure the future of the brand - and could even find himself playing a role for the troubled South African Football Association in the very near future.

All-rounder Kaizer also spoke fondly about his years as a cricketer at St John's in Johannesburg and Harrow School west of London, recalling: "I opened the batting with Nick Compton - who now plays for Middlesex and England - for Harrow against Eton at Lord's (here's what I wrote at the time http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/story/91194.html) in 2000.

"I was in the first team for two years, but the first time our traditional historic game first played in 1805) between the old private schools was called off because of rain. That was a disaster.

"It was such a big thing to go out and bat at Lord's. My dad Kaizer and the whole family turned up. Okay, I got a duck that day but I did get a century or two in the UK!

"I also grew up playing against Proteas captain Graeme Smith, who was at King Edward School. And yes, it's true, Ali Bacher wanted me to play for the Proteas, but football was my priority.

"I even spent time at the Chelsea academy when John Terry was around in the 90s, it was fabulous to be there."

Motaung, who played over 100 games for Chiefs and 22 times for 1860 Munich, paid tribute to former international referee David Elleray, his housemaster at Harrow, but accepts:  "Now I must bow out - perhaps I'll play a bit of five-a-side, golf, cricket. But now it's about what I can achieve off the field. And about my family. Being a dad is a full-time job too!

"I have many plans, business and football, that I must put in place.

"I just have to say it's such a privilege to be part of Kaizer Chiefs, the team my dad started, winning the league last year - then going nine games unbeaten after a rock start this season.

"Polokwane last night was magnificent. A full house at the Peter Mokabe. What a pleasure."





The Ballz link is here: http://www.ballz.co.za/bollockz-neal-collins/kaizer-motaung-talks-to-neal-collins/3272

BOLLOCKZ! my innovative football show on www.ballz.co.za airs every Thursday from 9am-11am. See Ballz' channel for our growing library of fascinating football interviews with the big names. 

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal & Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

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Bob Woolmer remembered: Pakistan Fixes Things Good: The Two Men Who May Have Stopped Them Both Died

Since writing this blog, this has appeared, from Clive Rice, the former South Africa captain: http://www.sport24.co.za/Cricket/Mafia-murdered-Hansie-Rice-20100908

BOB WOOLMER died on March 18, 2007 in Kingston, Jamaica, hours after Pakistan’s shock World Cup defeat against Ireland.

Initial reports suggested the India-born Pakistan coach was strangled, with bruising on the neck. And poisoned, according to toxicology reports. Fit for his age and still considered one of the best coaches in the world at 58, we are now expected to believe the former England Test batsman died of a heart attack, though the Jamaican jury at his inquest bravely left us with an “open verdict” on his sudden death.

At the time, I was told Woolmer was killed because he hadn’t “informed the correct authorities” that Pakistan were going to lose to the minnows and crash out of the World Cup. Apparently people in very high places would have made a killing on the Asian betting markets if only the coach had warned them a major upset was imminent.

Of course, Woolmer – coach of South Africa when that other infamous match-fixer Hansie Cronje was their crooked captain – could not have known. It was a game of cricket. You don’t know the result until the last ball is bowled, the final wicket falls. That’s sport.

But, as we now know only too well thanks to last Sunday’s News of the World revelations, Pakistan may be a slightly more predictable sporting team than the average. They know when they’re going to bowl no-balls. Three times it happened in the fourth and final Test against England at Lord’s last week. And cricketing agent and Carshalton Athletic FC owner Mazhar Majeed knew exactly when each no ball was going to happen. Allegedly.

And, because he knew they were going to lose the second Test in Australia over Christmas, “fixer” Majeed told the News of the World he earned around £830,000 having a Merry Christmas in Sydney. Allegedly.

Quite a Test that one. At the start of the final day, Australia led by 49 runs with two second innings wickets remaining. Somehow, amid a plethora of dropped catches, those two wickets added 124 runs. Pakistan, chasing 176, were skittled for 139. Fact.

So yes, Bob, apparently you should have known you were going to lose that crucial World Cup clash against Ireland at Sabina Park in 2007. But you said nothing. Either that, or the rant in the bus afterwards (he was reported to be “very, very angry” by the two Jaimaican policemen on board) came from a coach so angered by Cronje’s betrayal of his cricketing beliefs that he couldn’t believe he was being turned over again. New team, same old story.

I know that one of the Pakistani players in 2007 (I daren’t name him, big bloke) booked out his room on the 12^th floor of the team hotel after the defeat against Ireland. He booked back in later as “Mr Newman” and took a room on the fifth floor of the same Pegasus Hotel, adjacent to Woolmer.

This isn’t supposition. It’s fact. See http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-444416/Cricket-murder-Woolmer-case-police-dramatic-swoop-Pakistan-team-hotel.html. Two Pakistan players were questioned by police. One had “facial cuts”.

Woolmer was rumoured to be writing a book at the time. Some say it was a biography, others suggest he was about to blow the lid off match fixing. It had been started some weeks before the 2007 World Cup.

Obviously, it was never published. Shouting was heard from his room. The next morning he was found dead. After a brief examination the Jamaican police launched a murder investigation. Then Scotland Yard and others became involved. Strangulation was no longer mentioned. The substance in his blood was just “weed killer from the pitch”.

Despite the fact the post mortem still says he was strangled (Jamiaican pathologist Ere Seshaiah defiantly stuck to his guns, despite “advice” from various quarters), we are supposed to believe he died of natural courses.

Even his wife Gill, at her home in South Africa, insisted this morning: “We were given all the evidence, shown the photographs, and based on what we were told by the police in Jamaica, it was not murder.”

Strange that. Hansie Cronje died on a mountainside on June 1, 2002 when the unscheduled private jet he was travelling in from Johannesburg to George went down. And that wasn’t murder either. Pilot error apparently. Though I heard once his body was found a long way from the crash site. An inquest four years later blamed the two pilots, who also died. Investigation closed.

Two people who could have blown Pakistani match-fixing apart. Both fighting fit one minute, dead the next. Neither of them murdered. Incredible luck, these match fixers are having. What a movie that script would make. If only it was quite so unbelievable.

Given how high this goes in Pakistani government circles, I’ve got this picture of a CIA operative in shades growling: “Cricket? What the hell’s cricket? We can’t bring the Pakistan government down over cricket. We’ve got Osama Bin Laden to worry about.”

Or maybe I’m just a conspiracy theorist.

It's Just Not Cricket: Pakistan's Disgraceful Fixing Exposed

IT’S hard to believe. A cricket team with their backs against the wall, desperate to keep the game going in their own country... and they’ve let the fragile, cricket-speaking world down.

Yes, Pakistan, bow your heads in shame.

The elation of holding Australia to a 1-1 draw in the “neutral Test” here earlier in the summer can now be discounted. Their brave fight back in the current series against England is thrown into question. For Pakistan, where street cricket is the only game in town, the future is bleak.

While their nation struggles with unprecedented floods and political turmoil, their cricketers have seen fit to disgrace the nation. Not all of them apparently, but Mohammad Amir, the 18-year-old bowling sensation, is believed to be among the disgraced. Seven current players are implicated.

The News of the World, England’s sharpest and best-selling Sunday tabloid, devotes its first seven pages to the scandal this morning, and the rest of us are struggling to take in the enormity of their allegations.

I got wind of these events yesterday afternoon – but some have known for a lot longer. The central character, a former agent called Mazhar Majeed, fell for the News of the World’s incredible undercover reporter Mazher Mahmood. He took £140,000 off the journalist in “crisp £20 notes” at the Copthorne Tara hotel after an initial £10,000 deposit.

Then he sat back and oozed: “I’m going to give you three no-balls to prove what’s happening. If you play this right, you will make a lot of money, believe me.”

And, bang on cue, Amir – who became the youngest cricketer to make the Lord’s honours board on Friday when he took his fifth wicket – bowled a huge no-ball. So too did Mohammed Asif. Three times, they produced huge no-balls at exactly the right moment. And they did so after discussions with their corrupt captain Salman Butt.

The evidence is clear. First ball of the third over. Third ball of Amir’s third over after a chat with Butt which saw no fielders moved. Last ball of the tenth over. It’s all there in print.

And these incidents, apparently, are just the tip of the iceberg. Majeed told the News of the World: “I’ve been doing it with them, the Pakistani team, for two-and-a-half years. We’ve made masses and masses of money. The players actually approached me about this.

“I deal with an Indian party. The one-dayers and the Twenty20s are about to start and we’re going to make a hell of a lot.

“They all want Butt to be captain. They want to lose anyway. The Twenty20s are easiest.”

It stinks. Pakistan can’t play at home anymore since the tragic shootings during the Sri Lanka series. The ECB kindly allowed them to play Australia in England... and this is the thanks they get.

Scotland Yard are now investigating. The ECB and ICC have released a statement. But today the Lord’s Test went on, with Pakistan going down in flames to lose the series 3-1.

But suddenly it doesn’t matter. It’s just not cricket. No balls? Pakistan’s cricketers can certainly be accused of that.

Hales storm: While England toil, Notts take a giant stride... and has anybody else ever been out in the 90s twice in one day?

Alex is my God-son, got him on the phone after the game. Nobody else has any record of a first class batsman getting out in the 90s twice in a day. And Notts should now win the title after his heroics. He's been touted for England by Atherton and Lloyd several times.

NOTTINGHAMSHIRE’S young sensation Alex Hales showed England’s openers how to bat yesterday – and guided his county to the brink of the County Championship title with a three-wicket win over Lancashire at Trent Bridge.

The Buckinghamshire-born 21-year-old top scored in both innings – but suffered what many would consider two major misfortunes, becoming the county’s first batsman to be out in the 90s twice in one day.

But as he said afterwards: “It was bitter-sweet really. I wanted to smash my bat when I was out for 98 early in the day – and I was bitterly disappointed to be out for 93 in the second innings. But I knew I’d put us in a strong position.”

While England’s upper order struggled at Lord’s before the revival from Jonathan Trott and Hales’s Notts team-mate Stuart Broad, the 6ft 4in opener – already part of England’s performance squad - emerged on day four of the crucial Championship tussle on 87 not out after day three had been rained off.

Notts declared soon after his departure for 98, scored off 176 balls and as Hales said afterwards: “Fair play to Lancashire. They made a game of it. They set us a decent target. But they had to win to stay in the race.

“The dressing room is buzzing tonight. We’ve got three games left and we probably only need one more win to sew up the title.”

Hales, from unfashionable Chesham High School, only squeezed into England’s junior ranks as an Under 19 despite a string of record-breaking performances in his teenage years. He scored 225 on his first class debut for the MCC’s Young Cricketers at 18 and scored 52 off a single over (including three no-balls, eight sixes and a four) to win a Twenty20 tournament at Lord’s aged 16.

He certainly has a sporting pedigree. His father Gary and uncle David have broken all sorts of club cricket records around west London while his tennis-playing grand-father Den twice took Rod Laver to five sets at Wimbledon in the 1960s.

Hales’ rise to prominence after signing for Nottinghamshire three years ago began last year when he secured his first team spot with a glorious 150 against Worcestershire in the Pro40, the highest score in the competition last summer.

After a lean spell over the past month, two big scores in the critical game against Lancashire were, as he puts it “just what I needed”.

A useful footballer with a talent for anything from tennis to golf, Hales added: “It’s not just about me. The lads batted well at the death to get us there. And watching Broadie score his first Test ton for England kept everyone at Trent Bridge upbeat too.”

Set 260 to win by Lancashire captain Glen Chapple in two sessions (64 overs at a rate of just over four an over), Hales raced to 93 off just 125 balls with wickets tumbling around him just as they had in the first innings.

He departed, caught by wicketkeeper Luke Sutton off Gary Keedy, leaving Ali Brown (65) and Steven Mullaney (34 not out) to see Notts through a couple of late wobbles and on to a three-wicket victory.

Having conjured a win from what looked a certain draw after a soggy day three, Notts are 16 points clear of second-placed Somerset, with a game in hand. Hales grinned: “This is why you play professional cricket. To be in this position. But it’s not won yet.”

Pietersen relaxed about the boos flowing on Boxing Day

KEVIN PIETERSEN is hoping the festive spirit will prevail at Kingsmead (above, with my Hilton Hotel looming behind the main stand) on Saturday and that the Christmas boos will have dried up by the time the Boxing Day Test starts in Durban.

In fact, the pre-Christmas spirit, with the wives and girlfriends now in the England hotel, is so strong, Pietersen even held out an olive branch to South African captain Graeme Smith, insisting: “He’s turned into a really nice guy.”

You can almost hear the “Ho, ho, ho” as he prepares to play back where it all began for him in 1999 where he got 61 not out and four wickets for the Natal Dolphins against Nasser Hussain’s England tourists. Apparently that was the day he contacted the England officials and said he was interested in switching allegiances.

Michael Vaughan, on his first tour at the time, later suggested Yorkshire should sign him, but he ended up with Nottinghamshire, then Hampshire. And the rest is history.

Given his roots in Pietermaritzburg, about 40 miles inland, his return to this humid Indian Ocean port beneath an England cap could yet be greeted with a tirade of abuse from Kingsmead’s notorious Castle Corner.

I am currently about 200 yards from there in room 111 of the Hilton Hotel (above, it overlooks the ground) with the Living With The Lions tour party, led by the fabulously friendly Brett (see their link on this page). I've got Graeme Smith and the South Africans in the same hotel while England are 10 miles north up the coast in the Oyster Box in Umhlanga. Should be an interesting Christmas with the Proteas in the hotel bar! It's cloudy but muggy in Durban, which is packed to the rafters judging by my time in the downtown traffic jams today.

We can expect a huge crowd on Saturday, this is summer holiday time in Durban, but after his two fine knocks of 40 and 81 in the drawn first Test at Centurion were greeted with polite applause, Pietersen i s hoping he – and fellow South African-born Englishmen Jonathan Trott, Matt Prior and Andrew Strauss – are over the worst of the abuse.

Not that it gets to him of course. He said: "I don't mind the booing. The opposition get a fair amount of stick when they tour a country and that happens when Australia come to us.

"As long as good cricket is respected, I don't mind. I don't mind being abused on the boundary. I don't mind any of that stuff.

"When you field for 240 overs like we did in the First Test, it can be quite boring so it's fun to have some interaction with the crowd.”

Widely reviled by when he first appeared in his mother country as an Englishman during the one-day series in 2005, Pietersen, 29, says: "I have a fantastic relationship with the South African players, I don't have a single problem on the field.

"I have played with Mark Boucher, Jacques Kallis and Dale Steyn in the IPL. And Graeme Smith has calmed down and turned into a really good guy.

“The only thing I don't like is when people swear and abuse you when there are kids around. I've had to ask the stewards to speak to the people concerned.

"A couple of times on this tour, kids have been waiting on the boundary for an autograph and people are swearing at me. That's not great.

"I'm not just saying it because I'm going to be a father - I never swear in front of kids."

Another man who started out in that tour match between the Dolphins and England in 1999 was a 16-year-old Hashim Amla.

Though over-shadowed by KP a decade ago, it was Amla’s patient ton in Centurion which ensured South Africa had worked their way into an unbeatable position by the end of day four.

And when he reached his century, his old Natal team-mate Pietersen was there to shake his hand. Amla, who dismissed his first century at Lord’s saying: “I’ve always thought Durban was the home of cricket,” may not be as prominent in the headlines as Pietersen, but he forms a vital part of the South African resistance movement.

Yet to score a hundred at his home ground, the generously-bearded Amla, a devout Muslim unlikely to pick up Gillette or Castle Lager as personal sponsors, grins: “Of course I would love to score a Test ton at Kingsmead, but I don’t look too far ahead.

“I’m just concerned about the process of batting, focusing on each ball as it comes, doing my job.

“If you start thinking too far ahead, you upset that process.”

Often criticised for his awkward stance and stolid approach, the happily low-key Amla, born in Durban to a family from Gujarat, adds: “So long as I score runs, nobody will say anything. But when I got through a bad patch, I expect the same old comments to come out.”

England are set to field an unchanged side on Boxing Day, with coach Andy Flower refusing to axe the off-form Ian Bell for an extra seamer in Ryan Sidebottom. South Africa are still waiting for a final verdict on Dale Steyn’s hamstring.

The world’s top-ranked Test bowler withdrew at the last minute before the first Test but Amla, who could yet become South Africa's first non-white captain, argues: “Dale Steyn’s return is the key for us. He brings so much experience to our bowling unit. But we aren’t worried about that. We are looking forward to the challenge.”