Disgustingly dreadful.

You would have to go some to offer a more biting description of a match that was, by all accounts, exactly this.

That it came from the winning director of rugby, in this instance Chris Boyd of Northampton, who was withering in his assessment after the Saints had beaten Benetton 33-20 last weekend, gave it a sting all its own.

“That was a disgustingly dreadful performance,” he raged. “I apologise to everyone for that performance. It was a horrible game. I thought we were terrible.”

In this age of sanitised comments and sickly spin, this judgment was beyond refreshing. A coach copping it, effectively rubbishing his own contribution, is as rare as Robert du Preez buying a round of beers for a bunch of reporters.

This is the same Du Preez who last year ripped into his own team after the Sharks shipped 50-plus points against the Jaguares. “We were just incredibly poor today,” he groaned.

Apologies do happen, but you must look long and hard to find them in contemporary sport. Ironically, it was 20 years ago this week that Hansie Cronje engineered an innings forfeiture on the fifth day of a dead Test spoiled by constant rain when he made the daring offer to his England counterpart Nasser Hussain. He was lauded for his boldness, but we weren’t to know the crooked machinations that inspired the move.

When it all blew up in his face and he testified at the King Commission in 2000, he was contrite. “I was not honest,” said the late Proteas captain, “and I apologise unreservedly.”

It was a sad, gut-wrenching moment to witness, more so that it came beyond the context of a mere game. By then, Cronje’s career had been destroyed. He was fighting for his life. Two years later, he was dead, the victim of a plane crash.

We had the Australian cricketers in tears after last year’s shenanigans, but they could hardly do anything but apologise. When you’ve been found out, it’s about the only thing you can do – if you’re smart and hope to turn things around.

But it’s seldom easy; often, it’s an acknowledgement of a moral failing, a sign of weakness.

For instance, this week, the Houston Astros baseball franchise fired their manager, AJ Hinch, and general manager Jeff Luhnow after a Major League Baseball investigation concluded the club cheated during their 2017 World Series-winning season.

Luhnow offered what appeared to be a fulsome apology, but then back-tracked, effectively making it a sorry-not-sorry apology.

“I am not a cheater . . . the sign-stealing initiative was not planned or directed by baseball management; the trash-can banging was driven and executed by players, and the video decoding of signs originated and was executed by lower-level employees working with the bench coach.”

That’s just the point. Sometimes it’s damn hard to put up your hand and say sorry, more so when you are not.

Honesty is seldom a bad thing in sport. Gavin Hunt’s shrill remarks this week about his players being tapped up by rival coaches was alarming, but necessary. Kudos to the Bidvest Wits coach for putting it out there.

Straight speak is in short supply in modern sport, so we should cherish those rare moments we get to hear it.

Bring on the straight shooters. – © Sunday Tribune