Former South Africa all-rounder Vernon Philander has undertaken legal action against Cricket South Africa over an alleged breach of contract.
Vernon Philander retired from international cricket in January 2020. In his 14-year career, he played 64 Tests, 30 ODIs, and 7 T20Is.
Vernon Philander retired from international cricket in 2020
In an interview with IOL Sport, Vernon Philander revealed that CSA offered him an upgrade in his contract if he decline the Kolpak deal so he decided to continue.
“It was during the 2018 tour of Sri Lanka when Cricket SA were very concerned about players leaving the national team and taking up Kolpak contracts in England.
“We had just lost a host of bowlers like Kyle (Abbott), Marchant (de Lange), Parny (Wayne Parnell) to Kolpak and Morne Morkel also retired to join Surrey. CSA were worried about losing more and they were aware that I had plenty of offers from a number of English counties,” Philander said.
“It was at this stage that Corrie van Zyl (CSA’s former acting director of cricket and head of pathways and development) flew to Colombo to discuss my future with the Proteas. Firstly, my agent, Arthur Turner should have been present in those meetings but obviously wasn’t because we were in Sri Lanka,” he added further.
“It was during these meetings that it was discussed that my contract would be upgraded if I remained eligible for the Proteas. After the meetings, I immediately called Arthur and told him I was happy with the proposal and that I would continue playing for the Proteas in terms of the new agreements,” he said.
However, Philander said that the upgraded amount was paid for one season as he was degraded in the same pay level, citing the reason that he wasn’t available for domestic franchise cricket.
“I was paid the new amount for the next season, but not the following year. I was told that due to me not playing franchise cricket they could not pay me what was previously agreed upon.
“This has no bearing on my national contract. They presented their ‘ranking system’ which made no sense as I had actually gone up in the ICC Test rankings,” Philander said.
Philander also revealed that he contacted to South African Cricketers Association (Saca) over the matter but they said that it’s between him and the board and they can’t help.
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