With the appointment of Ray Jennings as coach, the United Cricket Board of South Africa is hoping to bring about a change in fortune for the national side.
Jennings, who played his first-class cricket during the sporting sanctions of the 1970s and 1980s, was one of the generation of players unlucky enough to miss out on Test honours.
He did play some unofficial Tests against the rebel tourists, but most of the time he turned out for the Transvaal side known as "The Mean Machine," where he was captained by Clive Rice.
In those days there were no official coaches and Jennings occasionally did some of the coaching on an ad hoc basis.
Rice, a highly talented all-rounder who also tasted plenty of success for Nottinghamshire, told BBC Sport Jennings was an intelligent choice as a successor to Eric Simons.
He said: "He will take to the international scene like a duck to water.
"He will be able to handle the adjustment from provincial cricket, that's not even in doubt. He will be right in there scrapping it out with the best of them.
"There is no doubt Ray can change the fortunes of South African international cricket."
Rice says Jennings will need to be given space and time to do things his own way and is fearful that is something that the UCB will not allow to happen.
"He's a very good coach and he knows what he wants, but if his hands are tied because of other people's agendas then he's got no chance."
By only giving the new coach a contract lasting until May 2005, the UCB seem to be confirming their own confusion, claims Rice.
He added: "If you run a public company like South Africa's cricket team have been peforming, who goes? The management or the workers?
"They put the blame at Shaun Pollock's doorstep [after the World Cup debacle] and now they have put it at Simons' doorstep.
"It concerns me that Jennings might just be another statistic due to bad management."
Fomer South African Test opener Peter Kirsten said: "I think Jennings has got a reputation of being quite a hard man but he's got some good ideas and has done a good job with Easterns over the years.
"The boys need a bit of a kicking up the back-side and he's a good man to do that. He's probably trying to get a little bit of enthusiasm back into the South African side."
Kirsten discounted the view before Jennings' appointment that an Australian might be asked to do the job.
Himself the coach of Western Province/Boland, he said: "If that's going to happen it doesn't say much for my fellow South African coaches."
Generally, Kirsten is optimistic about the future of South African cricket, adding: "If we continue to work hard on the domestic front there's a lot of talent in South Africa and the boys will be back on track soon enough."
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If his hands are tied because of other people's agendas then he's got no chance 