Between 1982 and 1990, during apartheid in South Africa, there were seven rebel tours made by unofficial international cricket teams to the country.
They were known as rebel tours because the international cricketing bodies banned South Africa from competitive international cricket throughout this period because of apartheid. As such the tours were organised and conducted despite the express disapproval of national cricket boards and governments, the International Cricket Conference and international organisations such as the United Nations.Pg 35–71, Peter May, The Rebel Tours: Cricket's Crisis of Conscience, 2009 The tours were the subject of enormous controversy and remain a sensitive topic throughout the cricket-playing world.
Origins
Until Olympic exclusion in 1964 and the D'Oliveira affair in 1968, only white athletes had been allowed to represent South Africa in international sport, a reflection of apartheid society in South Africa from 1948, and the social conventions prior to that time.Pg 10–54, Douglas Booth, The Race Game: Sport and Politics in South Africa, 1998.
In 1971, an international sports boycott was instituted against South Africa to voice global disapproval of their selection policies and apartheid in general. South Africa subsequently became a world sporting pariah, and were excluded from the Olympics, the FIFA World Cup, Test cricket, international rugby union and a host of other sports.Pg 99, Booth, 1998
The boycott effected measurable change on policy and opinion in sports selection – and cricket in particular. In 1976, the South African Cricket Union (SACU) was created to administer the game in the republic on a multi-racial, meritocratic basis: so-called "normal" cricket.Pg 223–5, André Odendaal, The African Game, 2003 However, this was insufficient to ensure South Africa's re-admission to international cricket. Inside the Republic, many non-whites resented "normal" cricket, which was seen as a feeble concession in the wider context of life under apartheid, and declined to take part.Pg 225, Odendaal, 2003 Outside the Republic, three of the six ICC Full Members—India, Pakistan and the West Indies—flatly refused to countenance re-admission until apartheid itself was dismantled.Pg 54, May 2009
After a decade of isolation, cricket in the country was weak: standards, attendances and youth participation were all declining. Overseas, the game had been revolutionised by the World Cup and World Series Cricket, but isolation had deprived South Africa of these commercial and competitive engines. In 1979, Doug Insole, an English representative on the ICC, told SACU's Ali Bacher: "Until apartheid goes, you can forget about getting back into world cricket."Pg 175, Rodney Hartman, Ali: The Life of Ali Bacher, 2004.
Bacher and SACU felt obliged to act to "keep the game alive in South Africa". Since players were endangering their careers by breaking the boycott, SACU had to offer substantial sums to entice their targets. These rebels would play "unofficial" internationals against a South Africa team who considered themselves as strong as any team in world cricket, except the West Indies. In the earliest rebel tours, Mike Procter and Peter Kirsten captained home teams featuring Barry Richards, Graeme Pollock, Clive Rice and Garth Le Roux. By their conclusion in 1990, many of them had retired and were replaced by the likes of Hansie Cronje and Allan Donald.May 2009
The boycott movement opposed any such tours: they felt that engagement lent credibility and a propaganda coup to the National Party. The SACU insisted that all funding came directly from commercial sponsorship, and that the tours would be conducted independently of government. Initially, at least, overseas opponents could not prove otherwise, while inside South Africa, non-white opposition, as under apartheid more generally, was barely heard due to restrictions on freedoms of press, speech and assembly.Pg 55, May 2009
England XI, 1981–82
The first major tour was by an English team led by Graham Gooch in March 1982. Twelve cricketers, 11 of them with Test caps, had agreed in secret to make a one-month tour of the Republic. The news only broke when they arrived in Johannesburg. The players expected a brief public outcry and a slap on the wrist from the ICC. Instead they were the subject of global outrage among press and politicians, and labelled "the Dirty Dozen" in the Houses of Parliament.Pg 71–108, May 2009
The reaction in South Africa could not have been more different. The government and white newspapers hailed the return of international cricket. Apart from Ian Botham, it was said, this was the full-strength England team.Pg 39, Mike Procter with Pat Murphy, South Africa: The Years of Isolation, 1994 Springbok colours were awarded to the home side in a series of three "Tests". There were also three "one-day internationals".
The on-field action "made a mockery of the immense off-field publicity".Peter May and Tristan Holme, SPIN Magazine, November 2009 The so-called South African Breweries XI were under-prepared and, with the exception of Gooch and Emburey, either past their best or fairly marginal members of the England side (in fact, Taylor and later call-ups Humpage and Sidebottom had not played a Test for England at the time, and Humpage never did play a Test at all). They were beaten by a South Africa team for whom the uncapped Jimmy Cook and Vintcent van der Bijl starred. The Proteas, captained by Mike Procter, won the "Test" series 1–0 and "ODI" series 3–0.
The rebels, who numbered 15 after hiring three further players to cover injuries, all received three-year bans from international cricket. These suspensions ended the careers of more than half the squad including Geoffrey Boycott, the world's leading Test run-scorer at that time. Lever (1), Sidebottom (1), Taylor (2), Willey (6) and Larkins (7) each played a few more Tests, but only Gooch and Emburey had extensive Test careers afterwards. Both later captained England – Emburey for two tests in 1988 against the West Indies, having been a fixture in the side since his return in 1985, and Gooch for the final test of that series, then later as the regular captain from 1989 to 1993, remaining as a player for two more years. Emburey also went on England's second rebel tour in 1989, served another three-year ban for it, and was selected again for some matches between 1992 and 1995.Pg 98, May 2009
Squad: Graham Gooch (captain), Dennis Amiss, Geoffrey Boycott, John Emburey, Mike Hendrick, Geoff Humpage, Alan Knott, Wayne Larkins, John Lever, Chris Old, Arnold Sidebottom, Les Taylor, Derek Underwood, Peter Willey, Bob Woolmer. Graham Dilley had pulled out of the tour before it got underway.
Arosa Sri Lanka, 1982–83
Sri Lanka was a fledgling Test nation in 1982, playing their inaugural match against England at Colombo in February of that year. Bandula Warnapura's side were beaten by seven wickets against an experienced visiting team and would fail to win four further Tests as the year progressed.
Then in October it was announced that Warnapura was leading a 14-man rebel squad to South Africa. The team would be called Arosa Sri Lanka after the initials of their player manager Anthony Ralph Opatha and the host nation. The players were vehemently denounced across India, Pakistan and the Caribbean as well as in their homeland.
For the second successive tour, white South Africa was forced to put on a brave front in acclaiming sporting triumph where there was none. A full-strength Sri Lankan team was some way off international competitiveness so it was little surprise that a makeshift rebel outfit was utterly humiliated, failing to win a single tour match. Now captained by Peter Kirsten of Western Province, South Africa comfortably won all four 'ODIs' and both 'Tests'. Lawrence Seeff, who replaced the injured Barry Richards, and Graeme Pollock made 188 and 197 respectively in the second 'Test' but protested that the matches could not be classed as international cricket. SACU, trying to protect the 'unofficial international' brand it had created, fined them for the admission.pg 131 May 2009
Life became very difficult for the Sri Lankans who were ostracised at home for a decision many called treasonous. All players received a 25-year ban from the Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka, which would be lifted in 1991. None played international cricket for the island again, even after the ban was lifted, although Aponso represented the Netherlands in the 1996 Cricket World Cup at the age of 43.
Squad: Bandula Warnapura (captain), Flavian Aponso, Hemantha Devapriya, Lantra Fernando, Mahes Goonatilleke, Nirmal Hettiaratchi, Lalith Kaluperuma, Susantha Karunaratne, Bernard Perera, Anura Ranasinghe, Ajit de Silva, Bandula de Silva, Jeryl Woutersz, Tony Opatha (player/manager).
West Indies tours, 1982–83 and 1983–84
The West Indian players were mainly talented understudies struggling to break into the great West Indian Test team of the period, or men past their prime as Test players. First-class cricketers in the West Indies were then poorly paid and the participants, many of whom had irregular or no employment in the off-season, received between US$100,000 and US$125,000 for the two tours. West Indies cricket was so strong that Clive Lloyd had little need for the likes of Lawrence Rowe, Collis King and Sylvester Clarke. Rowe has since stated that he and several other players were disillusioned with the West Indies Cricket Board for not selecting them despite good performances.
The strength of Caribbean cricket was evidenced in the 'international' matches, where South Africa received their first real test. A fiercely contested four-week series in 1982–3 took 'unofficial internationals' to new heights, the Proteas winning the one-day series 4–2 while the 'Test' series was drawn 1–1. The dominant theme of the match-ups was West Indian fast bowling. Colin Croft was one of four World Cup winners in the party. Their pace battery, featuring Clarke, Croft, Stephenson, Bernard Julien and Ezra Moseley, considerably unsettled the Proteas batsmen, who were forced to wear helmets for the first time.
The frantic first series, again organised in secret and conducted on the hoof, set up a fierce battle when the West Indians returned for a full tour the following season. Clarke was by now the dominant player on either side, claiming four five-wicket hauls in the 2–1 'Test' series win. The West Indian XI also won the one-day series 4–2, helped slightly by the Proteas weakening: Barry Richards and Vince van der Bijl retired in 1983, and Mike Procter, 36, played only a single 'one-day' international over both tours.Pg 138–98, May 2009. Henry Fotheringham, Ken McEwan, Rupert Hanley, Dave Richardson and Mandy Yachad made their debuts for South Africa. Clive Rice was handed the captaincy for the 3rd and 4th "Tests" after the sacking of Peter Kirsten for the 'ODI' series defeat. Kirsten maintained his place in the team and top scored in the next match. Graham Gooch played against the West Indies team during both tours as a member of a South African provincial side.
The improvement in the on-field action was in strict contrast to the off-field environment. South Africa stood permanently on the brink of civil war as PW Botha's brutal government repressed the black majority and excluded them from a new 'multi-racial' parliament. This oppression was met with violent reprisals while the rebels were controversial figures in the townships that had worshipped West Indian cricketers only to see them collaborating with the apartheid enemy.Sky Sports, Out of the Wilderness Part 2, August 2008.