South Africa's dope smokers apologise as they arrive home

South Africa's dope-smoking cricketers arrived home from the Caribbean on Saturday and immediately apologised for the incident which took the gloss off a remarkably successful tour.

South Africa won the five-match Test series 2-1 and the subsequent one-day rubber 5-2, but with news of the ganja-smoking episode breaking on the eve of the sixth one-day international, attention was diverted from the cricket.

Five South African players and squad physiotherapist Craig Smith were all fined R10 000 for admitting smoking marijuana after the Test series had been wrapped up in the fourth Test match in Antigua.

The affair has preoccupied the South African media for the past and indecisiveness and a degree of evasion on the part of the United Cricket Board served only to add fuel to the flames.

The South African squad was split into two halves on coming home, with the majority of the side landing in Johannesburg and the Cape-based players going directly on to Cape Town.

In Johannesburg, Justin Kemp, one of the six along with Herschelle Gibbs, Paul Adams, Andre Nel, Roger Telemachus and Smith, read out a hand-written statement on behalf of the group.

"The squad members of the South African team who were on tour in the Caribbean would like to clarify a few points regarding the dope-smoking incident after the fourth Test and the Test series victory in Antigua," read the statement. "The players who admitted their involvement to the team and to the United Cricket Board are extremely regretful and remorseful of the incident and would like to apologise to the UCB, the cricket-loving public of South Africa and the West Indies for their indiscretion.

"The players involved would like to confirm to the South African public that this was a one-off incident and that it will not happen again on any South African cricket tour. The team now considers the dope-smoking incident to be closed and would like to inform all cricket lovers throughout the world that it will never happen again."

The statement was also read out by Smith in Cape Town.

No further action will be taken against the offenders, with the exception of Gibbs who had a three-match, R10 000 fine suspended sentence hanging over him at the time of the incident. UCB chief executive Gerald Majola said that Gibbs' case would be referred to a disciplinary committee.

Majola confirmed that the matter had been debated at some length during the UCB's executive committee meeting on Friday. He would not elaborate on the discussions other than to say than "different points of view from different people" had been held.

South Africa have no further international commitments until September when they tour Zimbabwe for two Tests and three one-day internationals. It now seems like that Gibbs will miss at least the Test matches and the first ODI.