IF any sportsman was badly affected by South Africa's long exile from the world's sporting arenas, then that person was Clive Rice.
The great all-rounder remembers only too well the occasion he was picked to represent his country for the first time, for the 1971-72 tour of Australia.
''I was a 20-year-old kid then, and I was excited at the prospect of winning my first cap,'' he said. ''But then the tour was called off.'' That was the beginning of the South Africa's apartheid-related ban, an exile which lasted for two decades and was only lifted last year. Twenty-plus years passed by - the best years of Rice's career.
But the 44-year-old former Nottinghamshire star does not have any regrets. ''It was hard that isolation period. But then again it is like wishing that I could have played at Wimbledon or driven at the British Grand Prix . . . I just wasn't able to do it and I have no regrets about it.
''I was still fortunate to play against the best players in the world,'' added Rice.
Rice still plays competitive first-class cricket for Natal, and takes a keen interest, albeit from a distance, in the fortunes of the national side.