Lonely time for WAGS

It will be a lonely Valentine's Day for most of the Proteas' WAGs - wives and girlfriends - with the Cricket World Cup in Australia and New Zealand starting on that day.

But AB de Villiers' wife Danielle, JP Duminy's spouse Sue, Hashim Amla's wife Sumaiyah, Faf du Plessis's wife Imari, and Quinton de Kock's girlfriend Sasha, among others, will be allowed to see their superstar partners at some stage during the six-week-long tournament, said Cricket SA.

Proteas media officer Lerato Malekutu confirmed the players will be allowed to spend time with their partners some time during the tournament which ends on March 29. She said the decision was taken by team management.

"There is an official window period in which Cricket SA [pays for] flights and accommodation [but] if a partner comes outside that period the player or management foots the bill."

It is unclear if partners of Bafana Bafana players - among them Andile Jali's girlfriend Nonhle Ndala, Oupa Manyisa's wife Johanna, Bernard Parker's wife Wendy and Bongani Zungu's partner Khanyi Cele - will watch their men in action during the three-week-long Africa Cup of Nations, which is under way in Equatorial Guinea.

SA Football Association spokesman Dominic Chimhavi said: "The association leaves [that] strictly at the discretion of the head coach [Shakes Mashaba]."

Psychologist Clinton Gahwiler, of the Sports Science Institute of SA, said spouses played an important role on tour: "One of the challenges, particularly for cricketers, is the time they spend away from home; no other sport comes close. So, it is important to manage that carefully."