Temba Bavuma: The poster boy of 'racial quota' criticism inspires South Africa past the 'chokers' tag

Temba Bavuma, whose appointment as South Africa’s first black African Test captain in 2023 was met with scepticism, led South Africa to their first-ever ICC world title on Saturday. read more

Temba Bavuma holds the ICC Test Mace poses with the ICC Test Mace with his son in his arm after leading South Africa to a five-wicket victory over Australia in the World Test Championship Final at Lord's. Reuters

It’s been more than three decades since the late Nelson Mandela was elected President of the Republic of South Africa, marking the end of decades of ‘Apartheid’ rule in the country. Race, however, continues to dominate nearly every aspect of life in South Africa, including sport.

Therefore, it hardly comes as a surprise that the ruling African National Congress (ANC) government’s push for racial transformation in sports in the last couple of decades, particularly in ‘white-dominated’ games such as rugby and cricket, has been met with scorn and has been in the news for negative reasons more often than not.

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And while the likes of Hashim Amla and Kagiso Rabada quickly established themselves as stars of the game with their meteoric rise, with the latter still going strong, there were quite a few others, especially black Africans, who have struggled to shed the tag of being sport’s equivalent of a ‘diversity hire’.

Fighting the ‘quota’ tag

South Africa Test and ODI captain Temba Bavuma happens to be one of those cricketers ridiculed for years as a ‘quota pick’, whose place in the national team in any format was questioned time and time again since he made his international debut in the home Test series against West Indies in December 2014.

Bavuma was second in line to take over the reins of the South African team, albeit in the white-ball formats. Quinton de Kock couldn’t quite handle the pressure of leading the Proteas across formats after Cricket South Africa (CSA) decided to move on from Faf du Plessis as their skipper, resulting in the board looking towards Bavuma for an answer.

And just two years after replacing de Kock as the white-ball skipper, Bavuma raised even more eyebrows after newly-appointed red-ball coach Shukri Conrad backed him to lead in the Test format over opening batter Dean Elgar.

Bavuma, who hails from the Langa township near Cape Town, ended up making history by becoming South Africa’s first black African Test captain.

Temba Bavuma made history in February 2023 by becoming the first black African to lead South Africa in Test cricket. Reuters

The Proteas had been playing cricket since the turn of the 20th century and were among the founding members of the Imperial Press Conference, which is currently known as the International Cricket Council.

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However, it took them more than a century – of which 22 years were spent in isolation – to appoint a non-white Test captain in the form of Ashwell Prince, who filled in for Graeme Smith during the 2006 tour of Sri Lanka. And even longer to appoint a black African.

Then, of course, there was the question of how Bavuma would actually perform as the leader of a team whose fortunes had nosedived in the years following the retirements of legends such as AB de Villiers, Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel, etc, towards the end of the 2010s.

Elgar, after all, was removed as captain after losing away Test assignments against England and Australia, with the Proteas getting thoroughly outplayed in the latter and only escaping a whitewash thanks to rain.

Bavuma silences his detractors in style

Bavuma did prove his credentials as a leader by guiding South Africa into the semi-finals of the 2023 ICC World Cup on the back of a clinical round-robin campaign in which they won seven out of nine games, including a dominant victory over eventual champions Australia.

As for the Test arena, his partnership with Conrad turned out to be an instant hit, with the Proteas going on to win eight out of their next nine Tests, with one draw and no defeats.

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Hardly anyone had backed the South Africans, who had sent a second-string team to New Zealand led by Neil Brand that ended up suffering a 0-2 sweep, to even finish among the top four in the 2023-25 World Test Championship cycle, let alone become the first team to qualify for the final.

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And that is exactly what they ended up achieving, on the back of seven consecutive victories – two of which came under Aiden Markram’s leadership in Bangladesh.

The critics, however, were still not satisfied and branded the Proteas as “lucky” for progressing into the WTC final on the back of sweeping two-Test rubbers against teams that historically had struggled in South African conditions. Never mind the fact that CSA had little control over the scheduling of the WTC cycle in which the ‘Big Three’ arranged five-match series with each other and left precious little for other teams.

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And for a moment, expectations of Australia steamrolling South Africa in the WTC final looked highly probable after the latter were bundled out for a paltry 138 on Day 2 following a dramatic collapse in which they lost their last five wickets for just 12 runs.

This South African team, however, is a different breed – one that has the sense of belief that was the hallmark of the legendary teams led by Smith and Hansie Cronje. It was that sense of belief that helped Bavuma and Co keep their nerves in check in a high-voltage ICC final and emerge triumphant by a five-wicket margin with a fightback for the ages .

And to give an idea of why Bavuma not only belongs to the Test level but deserves respect, the 35-year-old fought physical pain caused by a hamstring injury and continued batting despite hobbling between the wickets to score 66 crucial runs, which resulted in a match-defining 147-run stand for the third wicket with Markram (136) that allowed the Proteas to chase down a challenging 282-run target with relative ease.

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“We have prepared hard for this, we have worked hard for this moment. We came here with a lot of belief but also with a lot of doubters and we are happy that we were able to play well enough to get that type of result,” Bavuma said during the post-match presentation ceremony after masterminding what arguable is the greatest triumph in South African cricket history.

“For us as a country, here’s an opportunity for us, as divided as we are at times to forget all of that, to rejoice in this moment and just be one. I’m sure the people back home will be celebrating it with us and you can trust that we will be celebrating it massively as well,” he added.

The victory didn’t just help South Africa bury the “choker” tag for good, but has also forced the ICC and the ‘Big Three’ nations to take the Proteas more seriously as a Test nation.

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When @ProteasMenCSA win this apart from individual skills the leadership of Temba Bavuma has to be recognized. — Kumar Sangakkara (@KumarSanga2) June 14, 2025

It also highlighted the fact that the country’s racial transformation in sports didn’t just bear fruit in rugby, where the Siya Kolisi-led Springboks have won the last two World Cups and have surpassed New Zealand’s All Blacks as the most successful team in the sport’s history.

Cricket has joined the bandwagon, and it is two Persons of Colour (POC) in captain Bavuma and coach Conrad who get the lion’s share of the credit for transforming the Test team’s fortunes.

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The word ‘Temba’ translates to ‘Hope’ and that is exactly what the 35-year-old has instilled in the ‘Rainbow Nation’ with his heroics in London over the past four days.

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