Rabada victory: It wasn’t just down to Dali Mpofu

As lead counsel and through his sheer prominence in the South African judicial and political sphere, Dali Mpofu was unsurprisingly the face of Kagiso Rabada’s appeal against the International Cricket Council (ICC).

And after masterminding that successful process on Tuesday, the senior Advocate and national chairperson of the Economic Freedom Fighters’ reputation has been reinforced.

But Cricket South Africa (CSA) were quick to point out it was a team effort that led to Rabada overturning a two-match ban in the ongoing Test series against Australia.

“It would be amiss of me not to thank CSA’s legal team for the sterling work done at such short notice,” said Proteas team manager Mohammed Moosajee on Tuesday.

“CSA approached Advocate Mpofu and some of his junior counsel to collaborate. We’re really pleased wit their efforts and extremely grateful to them.”

Mpofu himself had stated on Twitter earlier that it was a team effort that made the successful appeal possible.

Given the time constraints as well a perception that the evidence was against Rabada, it was a pleasing but surprising outcome.

Moosajee didn’t want to go into detail on the arguments presented by Mpofu and co.

“I think it would be unfair to talk about the merits of the case and the exact arguments but it’s safe to say that there were key learnings for everybody,” he said.

“It will stimulate healthy debate and allow for people to sit around the table. We may need to look, together with the ICC, about processes relating to the establishment of independent judicial commissions and aspects such as the wording of code of conducts. We, as South Africa, would be happy to contribute to that.”

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