‘Sorry Shukri’: Dejected Dale Steyn cuts all ties with SA head coach’s ‘really wanted India to grovel’ remark | Cricket
South African fast-bowling legend Dale Steyn has publicly criticised national head coach Shukri Conrad for his controversial use of the word “grovel” while describing South Africa’s dominant position at the end of Day 4 of the second Test against India in Guwahati. Speaking on Cricket Live ahead of Day 5, Steyn made it clear he wanted no association with the remark, which has drawn widespread backlash due to its historical context.
Dale Steyn was really disappointed with Shukri Conrad’s comments
“I’m not on that boat, eh? I don’t like that. I almost don’t even want to make a comment about it,” Steyn said, visibly uneasy. “There are certain things you just don’t say. There’s stigma attached to it. It just wasn’t necessary. South Africa were in such a dominant position—saying nothing is enough. I’m just not on that boat.”
Steyn emphasised that even if Conrad’s tone lacked the harsher edge with which the phrase was once used, its history made it unacceptable. “Maybe I pick up his tone now—it’s not as harsh as Tony Greig’s. But that doesn’t matter. You just don’t use words like that. Toss it. You don’t have to say it. That’s disappointing. Sorry, Shukri, but that’s disappointing.”
His comments came after Anil Kumble and Cheteshwar Pujara also criticised the South Africa coach for invoking a term long associated with racism and historical trauma in cricket.
Conrad had said South Africa wanted India to “really grovel” by extending their second-innings batting to nearly 80 overs, forcing the fatigued hosts into a 549-run chase. He added that he was “stealing a phrase” from late England captain Tony Greig’s notorious statement before the 1976 home series against West Indies—one of cricket’s most inflammatory remarks.
Ahead of that series, Greig, who was of white South African heritage, declared: “If they’re down, they grovel, and I intend… to make them grovel.” The statement, aimed at a West Indies team whose players were descendants of enslaved Africans and who carried generations of racial suffering, sparked outrage across the Caribbean. Captain Clive Lloyd later said: “The word ‘grovel’ is one guaranteed to raise the blood pressure of any black man… We resolved to show him that the days for grovelling were over.”
Fuelled by that anger, West Indies demolished England 3–0, a series remembered as a defining moment of pride and resistance in Caribbean cricket.
Conrad’s revival of the term—directed at an Indian team with its own history of discrimination—has put the South African camp on the back foot, with Steyn’s disapproval adding significant weight to the criticism.
