THERE are many reasons why those who select the English cricket team may choose to omit a man who qualifies on merit, one or other form of indiscipline being the most common. Nowadays, it is inconceivable that they should do so on the grounds of his
skin colour, or because a racist regime does not approve of him.
But that, as Christopher Douglas's play Dolly recalled this week, was the case back in the supposedly enlightened 1960s. Basil D'Oliveira, after whom this drama was named, was the man who fell foul of two sets of authorities: the apartheid government of his native South Africa, and the weak-willed selectors of the MCC.
Born in 1931, as a Cape Coloured D'Oliveira had been barred from playing first-class cricket in his own land, and so moved to England in 1960. He took British citizenship, and made his Test debut against the West Indies in 1966.
He lost his place on occasion, but in 1968, with selection looming for the winter tour to South Africa, appeared sure of being chosen. Any doubt that he was in form evaporated during that summer's final Test against Australia, when he scored 158 in the first innings.
The MCC were aware, however, that his selection would probably lead to South Africa's canceling the tour – and that such a decision would mean the Republic's subsequent exclusion from competitive cricket. So they left him out, whimpering doubts about his ability as an all-rounder as an excuse.
When another cricketer then withdrew because of injury, they had to include D'Oliveira. The South Africans would not accept that, the tour was called off, and a more militant chapter in the campaign against sporting links with the apartheid government was opened.
That much is agreed as the bare bones of the case, and well remembered not only by cricket enthusiasts of a certain age but by anyone who was around at the time. The name D'Oliveira may mean as little as Ho Chi Minh or Grosvenor Square to anyone under 40, but it was a cause celebre of the day, and for a time almost as big an issue as the Vietnam War and the demonstrations against it.
Given the status of the D'Oliveira case as recent history, accounts of which can readily be accessed, the problem confronting Douglas was how to add to an understanding of the situation. In particular, what would a lightly fictionalised version of the story do that a documentary might not?
One of the most successful aspects of the exercise was the portrayal of D'Oliveira himself. In contrast to the saintly version offered up at the time by some of the media, he was shown as a flawed, over-sociable character, who struggled with the discipline required to be a top-class sportsman. To an extent this may have been an innate trait, but there was also a suggestion, lightly made yet clearly perceptible, that the man was under considerable stress for much of the time, and that the odd night out with friends might be a natural reaction.
The casual racism endemic to British society at the time was also dealt with, albeit at times too heavily. Close to the end of the drama, for example, D'Oliveira and his wife, also a Cape Coloured, are depicted watching a trailer on TV for The Black and White Minstrel Show. "On BBC1," the continuity announcer says. "In colour."
More effectively, at one point Mrs D explains why she does not want to go and watch her husband play; why she cannot feel part of the group which would now be called WAGs. "I wouldn't know what to say to anybody," she says. "They always talk about their hairdos and say 'You're so lucky you don't need make-up'."
Perhaps the most successful aspect of the play, however, was its portrayal of the duplicity of some of those involved. The British inability to say a straight 'No' to many a request can be infuriating to outsiders; for D'Oliveira, it became tantamount to betrayal.
The late Colin Cowdrey, for one, was shown saying different things in different situations. "I'll always want you in the side if possible," he said to D'Oliveira at one point, leaving any amount of wiggle room in those last two words. When it came to the meeting to select the side to tour South Africa, Cowdrey felt unable to bat for D'Oliveira.
"I've been here eight years and I still can't work you people out," D'Oliveira said to a friend early on in the play. Later, when the full scale of British two-facedness was becoming apparent, he made the same point about his new nation in a more critical manner. "You know where you are with the Boere back home, but these guys . . . "
What made it worse for D'Oliveira was that opposition to his joining the tour came from the left as well as the right. Peter Hain, then a young activist, was among those who said he should not have considered taking part.
In the end, Dolly might have felt to some like little more than an enactment of a history lesson. To those unfamiliar with the saga, however, it may well have been an eye-opener as to just how bad things were not so very long ago.
