Black Lives Matter: SA Coach Boucher Reveals Why Proteas Won’t Take Knee In Home Series Against England

As per Boucher, the reason behind this revised stance by the South African national cricket team is because the Proteas cricketers have already expressed their support towards the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement during a 3TC game played for the Solidarity Cup earlier in July.

Mark Boucher

South African team head coach Mark Boucher has revealed that the Proteas cricketers won’t be taking the knee but might wear black armbands as a mark to support the Black Lives Movement (BLM) in the upcoming series against England at home. As per Boucher, the reason behind this revised stance by the South African national cricket team is because the Proteas cricketers have already expressed their support towards the Black Lives Matter movement during a 3TC game played for the Solidarity Cup earlier in July. Boucher made the South African playing contingent, administrators, including director of cricket Graeme Smith aware of the fact that the South African cricketers stood rock solid behind the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement by kneeling on one knee and wearing black armbands during the ‘3TCricket’ match in Centurion for the Solidarity Cup on July 12. South Africa is set to host England for 3 T20Is and the same number of ODIs in a limited over series scheduled to be played from November 27 to December 9. The England white ball squad which landed in South Africa on Monday (November 16) have been placed in a 10-day quarantine period ahead of the commencement of the 3-match T20I series.

"I have spoken to the guy (Lungi Ngidi) who was driving the whole movement within our set-up, he is pretty happy that we have done what we needed to do, in particular at that (3TC) game. There are a couple of other issues that our president has raised going forward with regards to gender-based violence and the victims of Covid19. We are going to be addressing this with the team so if there is a black armband to wear, we will probably be wearing it because of the president's call,” Boucher said.

"It's an ongoing thing for us. It's not something that we have to continue to show. It's something that you have to live. That is exactly what we are trying to doing our dressing room at the moment with a big squad. If guys who brought it up are happy with it, that's great, but if they feel we have to do more, that will be a chat and that they are open to express their opinions,” he added.