“Ah well, that’s the way it goes, every man for himself.” Kim Hughes, who had resigned as Test captain after five successive losses to the West Indies, initially rebuffed South African approaches. But when his omission from the Ashes squad was followed by word that Wood, Wellham and Phillips had been paid by Packer to stay at home, Hughes lost what little commitment to establishment cricket he had left. “He could have played Test cricket for another couple of years for sure,” Border says. “The captaincy was just a part of the equation really. But that was a sad scenario where he got overlooked for the Ashes tour. “I suppose in his own mind he wasn’t all that enamoured with the ACB, and then they all got paid $US200,000 to go to South Africa. He’s just been dropped from the Australian side, so what do you do? You take it.” Hawke, Hayden and federal sports minister John Brown all fired off plenty of verbal rounds at the rebel tourists, the trip’s organiser Bruce Francis (who played three Tests for Australia in 1972) and the South African authorities. “It would be shameful if reports that a team of rebel Australian cricketers was preparing to visit South Africa turned out to be true,” Hawke said in parliamentary question time on April 16. “Notwithstanding the very considerable financial rewards which it is alleged are associated with this offer, I earnestly request any Australian cricketers who are contemplating accepting such an offer to think about the principles involved. “I ask them to think about the comfort that they would give to a racist regime by accepting that offer. I ask them to think about the plight of blacks in South Africa. I ask them to think about the reputations of themselves and of their country and to reject any offers they may have received.” Clive Lloyd remembers Hawke as a staunch opponent of apartheid, in much the same way as political leaders in the Caribbean were. “[Hawke] was very serious about apartheid,” Lloyd says. “And even when we were playing for Kerry Packer, I think we had a [contract] clause put in there by Mr [Michael] Manley, the then prime minister of Jamaica, that Kerry would not take the guys who were signed up to South Africa. “It was quite obvious how serious a lot of Commonwealth countries were about it, and guys were ostracised for going.” There were, of course, accusations of hypocrisy about questioning the rights of cricketers to play in South Africa while economic and trade relations continued to flow with Australia. No less an authority on cricket than Sir Donald Bradman took this view. “Of course the whole thing hinges on dirty rotten politics,” Bradman wrote to his friend Peter Brough in May 1985. “Our government freely trades with South Africa and it is total hypocrisy for them to prevent sporting contacts. The ‘black’ countries will never agree to re-admit South Africa and the final answer is a total split between the blacks and the whites.” Well-briefed by South African rebel tours organiser Ali Bacher and Francis, Hughes felt he was on a mission for cricket, and somehow even for humanity. “I am going to South Africa with an open, and I hope, intelligent mind,” Hughes told a press conference after he joined the tour. “I believe I have the ability to judge right and wrong. I also believe I will be able to comment and suggest ways the situation can be improved.” In July 1985, Packer met with South African Cricket Union principals Geoff Dakin and Joe Pamensky to complain that they were “poaching players that he wanted for the Australian team”, and warned Dakin: “Listen fella, you’re maybe a rooster today, but tomorrow you’re a feather duster!” Though Hawke publicly deflected accusations of double-standards, the sting of those kinds of words was evident in cabinet discussions – in particular the work of Hayden in foreign affairs. On August 19, with the Ashes series in full swing, a cabinet submission on Australian relations with South Africa was intended “to spread the burden of anti-apartheid measures more widely within the community.” Here was a major shift from the policy outlined in the 1983 cabinet papers, in which sporting boycotts were emphasised, but punitive economic measures were only to be considered if agreed to “by the United Nations Security Council and implemented by South Africa’s major trading partners”. Because of the August review, Hawke went to that year’s Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in the Bahamas with a clear vision for the gradual escalation of economic measures against South Africa. Those measures would kick in after the visit of an “eminent persons group” to the republic, led by Hawke’s predecessor Malcolm Fraser. Significantly, Fraser’s group was permitted to visit Nelson Mandela in prison, where he famously asked whether Bradman was still alive. However, the group did not achieve any progress in the removal of apartheid, thereby opening the way for harsher tactics. Neither Margaret Thatcher’s Britain nor Ronald Reagan’s United States wished to impose sanctions on South Africa, but the momentum started in Nassau would grow over the next couple of years. Reagan was, in fact, overruled by the US Congress, which voted to pass a range of economic strictures on South Africa in 1986. Hawke then met in 1987 in Vancouver with Commonwealth leaders and Australian-American banker Jim Wolfensohn (later head of the World Bank) to work through a plan to turn off the tap of international capital flowing into South Africa. That restriction on capital flows left the South African government with little choice but to choose drastic reform. The rebels made two tours of South Africa, after which Alderman, Trevor Hohns and Rackemann returned to Australian ranks when their bans expired. Greg Shipperd went on to a long and distinguished career as a coach. Others like McCurdy and Haysman stayed on in South Africa, while Mick Taylor, the youngest member of the squad, eventually served on the Cricket Victoria board. South Africa was changing. Mandela was released from prison in February 1990, and visited Australia in October. The nation rejoined world cricket, touring India in November 1991, and playing at the 1992 World Cup. Led by Kepler Wessels, the South Africans qualified for the semi-finals a few days before a whites-only referendum at home overwhelmingly backed abolishing apartheid. Lloyd, meanwhile, retains great admiration for Hawke, Packer and also Mandela. He visited South Africa in 1992 as a match referee. “I went to see Mandela after apartheid ended with Ali Bacher, and when we were approaching him, I’ll never forget he said, ‘Ah, here is a sportsman that I know,’” Lloyd recalls. “And that was quite something, because here was a man who had been incarcerated for many years, and he’s saying he knows who I am.” Even so, Lloyd has ruminated more than once on what life would have been like had he become the man in charge of Australian cricket, as championed by Hawke and Packer that summer day at Kirribilli House. The ACB gently rebuffed Hawke’s suggestion, but those conversations led ultimately to Bob Simpson becoming Australia’s first full-time coach, the start of the national cricket academy, and the beginnings of sustained success. “I really thought it was a missed opportunity because there were so many things I could have learned,” Lloyd says. “I’m sure, being backed by those two great men, it couldn’t go wrong.” News, results and expert analysis from the weekend of sport are sent every Monday. Sign up for our Sport newsletter.