Gibson: We’d like a beer with the Aussies

The current series between South Africa and Australia has been full of drama and headlines that have taken the focus away from the good cricket that’s been played, says Proteas coach Ottis Gibson.

Gibson, speaking to journalists before the team departed for Johannesburg for the final match of their four-Test contest, said the series had an edge that was different to the Ashes.

‘The Ashes is a lot of hype. This series, and I don’t know whether it’s because of what happened when South Africa was in Australia last time, but this one has had a bit of an edge to it,’ said Gibson.

The Proteas coach was involved in three Ashes as England’s bowling coach in 2006/07, 2009 and 2015, and finished on the winning side on two occasions.

‘At the end of an Ashes, you sit down and have a drink together. When we played against India, the series was tough, but at the end of every game, guys came and they had a drink together.

‘We haven’t had that opportunity with the Aussies because after every Test match there was some sort of drama. Somebody had to go and see the match referee. There was [always] some little conflict between the teams.

‘Cricket is still, at the end of the day, a gentleman’s game, and hopefully, the next Test can somewhere [push us] back towards [it] being a gentleman’s game and we can have a beer and enjoy it. Because with everything that’s gone on after every Test match, we’ve forgotten that there have been three very good Test matches that have had three results.

‘They smashed us in Durban and obviously, we had to go away and do a little bit of talking about better planning and organising, which we did. We played very well in Port Elizabeth and won, and we’ve come to Cape Town and won again. But in this series, there have been instances and headlines that always took it away from cricket, and that’s unfortunate,’ said Gibson.

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