Lionel Cronje’s first appearance for the Southern Kings in Super Rugby on Saturday meant that the former national age-group star has now represented six major South African unions or franchises - and had a stint at the Brumbies - in a career that started just eight seasons ago.
He’s not the only player who was rated as a youngster who has ended up being a journeyman who has never quite settled anywhere. But his story should be a salient lesson to both young players and agents on the cost that comes with being too impatient.
Saturday’s game against the Jaguares would have been a big moment in the life of 27-year-old Cronje. He cut a depressed figure around Durban last year and he was rightly wondering if he’d ever play top level rugby again after being jettisoned by the Sharks when that union had to cull players to stave off a possible financial crisis.
However not all Cronje’s short-lived tenures since being persuaded to leave Bloemfontein by Stormers coach Rassie Erasmus at the end of 2009 have been ended by his employers. Like many young players he has been impatient, and I learned of his impatience from Sharks coach John Plumtree in 2011.
At the time Cronje, mainly because of injury, had finally cracked the nod as the Stormers flyhalf and was turning in some solid performances. He wasn’t happy though and told the Sharks coaches that he wanted to move to Durban as he was tired of taking instruction from the Stormers coaches.
That didn’t exactly recommend him to Plumtree, for no coach likes to be told by a potential new recruit that he doesn’t like following instructions, so the Sharks didn’t sign him. So instead Cronje went off to the Bulls and the Lions before finally popping up in Durban during Jake White’s tenure as Sharks coach.
Why the Cronje story might be a lesson for other young players is because had he been more patient earlier in his career he may have ended up being more settled. That could have led to him realising his undoubted potential, instead of being in the position he is now of effectively going into his last chance saloon at the Eastern Cape franchise.
We are in an era where players expect instant gratification, and there have been several young players in recent times who have negatively impacted their own careers by being too impatient.
Remember Johan Sadie? He was a young centre who left the Stormers for the Bulls because he didn’t want to wait in a queue, which included Springbok centres Jean de Villiers, Jaque Fourie and Juan de Jongh, to get game time. His Pretoria move didn’t work out and he never became the player he could have been.
The Goosen and Sadie examples though aren’t nearly as tragic as what has befallen Johan Goosen.
I researched Goosen’s controversial departure from his French club for SA Rugby magazine. No-one wanted to be quoted but I got enough background from agents and other players in the saga to be able to agree with one source that there were no good people in the story.
Goosen’s agents were remiss for trying to make a quick buck out of his constant demand for special treatment by getting an increase in his contract with Racing-92 that resulted in him being tied to the Paris club for five years. It was irresponsible to contract a young player for that long, and with a E1-million release fee from the contract, there was little prospect of anyone being able to buy Goosen out once he realised that he couldn’t stomach being a Parisian for that long.
Not wanting to live in Paris would seem odd to most of the world’s population, but Goosen hails from Burgersdorp, and he is a farmer at heart.
And his club was also remiss for brow-beating Cronje - it did sound like he was either strongly coerced - into signing a letter that would make him unavailable to play for the Springboks. That was the main sticking point between club and player that gave rise to the later problems.
When Goosen was called up by the Boks he claimed he didn’t know about the clause preventing him from playing international rugby. And it does go against the applicable World Rugby regulation.
You will have to read the magazine piece for more detail, but no party comes out smelling of roses. The upshot is that unless Racing have some mercy and agree to release Goosen from the hold they have on him, the 24-year-old is going to be lost to rugby until 2020.
That would be tragic as it could have turned out so differently had Goosen received wiser counsel and been managed better, and if the player hadn’t wanted too much too quickly and thus rushed into a deal that really didn’t suit him. Unfortunately though it is usually age that makes you wiser and it will only be later in life he may look back on this time with deep regret and wish he had done things differently.