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Bertha stands by her man

Our Rediff correspondent

Although, Bertha Cronje felt "sick to the stomach" when her husband Hansie asked her to find and count the money he had hidden around their house, she firmly affirms that her love and faith in him never wavered.

"He has made other mistakes before. This wasn't the first", joked Bertha during a Sixty Minutes interview on Australian television on Sunday night.

Even Hansie himself feared that she would leave him when she discovered that she had been lied to. But Bertha says, "I don't think I ever saw Hansie in the way that other people saw him, because he wasn't the cricketer to me, he was my husband. He was a human being ... I don't think his hero image has been shattered for me. He will always be my hero."

However, there was a time when Hansie was not as sure and he admitted that his (mis)deeds had placed a strain on their marriage.

"I wouldn't have been surprised if my wife walked out on me but at no stage did I ever get that feeling and I've never had that feeling since the day we got married."

Calling her "brilliant", he said that in his darkest times, when he didn't even want to get out of bed, she was a "pillar of strength".

"I think one of the toughest things for me as a person is going to be to build up the trust again between myself and my wife."

Bertha said she had remained "calm" when her husband confessed to her. "I told him that it was all right, I think," she said. "I told him that it was good he was telling the truth now."

Counting the money, though, was not an easy thing to do. "I had that nauseous feeling in my stomach. I was anxious and I was confused. I counted half of it all wrong and then I stopped and brought it to Bloemfontein."