South Africa's high performance coach Mike Horn has revealed that the Proteas were forced to make changes to the team during the World Cup to meet quota requirements which left the side ‘flat’ in the semi-final.

Horn, who has been working with South Africa for four years now and was part of their World Cup support staff, said ‘politics’ had a role to play in the final selection of the squad.

“What actually happened was the (semi-final) team was the team that played against Sri Lanka,” Horn told Eyewitness News on Wednesday.

“We're not going into any politics, but it had a role to play.

“I had to do a little bit of talk to the guys after the team was selected and a little bit of energy was taken away from the quarter-finals where the right team played.”

The selection of Vernon Philander in place of the in-form Kyle Abbott is what Horn was pointing at. Abbot was part of the quarter-final squad which beat Sri Lanka but was surprisingly dropped for the semi-final against New Zealand.

Philander's selection raised the number of ‘players of colour’ – a term which encompasses black Africans, mixed-race people and those of Asian descent – to four. It was the same quota number which had been the subject of controversy in the past until it was abolished in 2007.

According to a report in South Africa's Sunday Times, the South African team was “fuming” over Philander's selection and captain AB de Villiers was reluctant to play in the match over the issue.

Cricket South Africa chief executive Haroon Lorgat, however, denied politics had a role to play during team selection at the World Cup.

“There was and is no political interference in our selections,” Lorgat said.

According to report by Netwerk24, Lorgat had sent a text message to South Africa head coach Russell Domingo on the morning of the match to pick another ‘player of colour’.

“This is utter nonsense reporting with false allegations being made,” Lorgat said in a statement.

Unofficial racial quotas were initially tried in rugby and cricket, once all-white sports in South Africa, following the country's first democratic elections in 1994.

They were considered a failure and caused deep resentment among some players who argued they were being unfairly disadvantaged. South African-born England Test cricketer Kevin Pietersen has said that he opted to leave his home country and qualify to play for England because of racial quotas.

Former South Africa paceman Fanie de Villiers believes bowling coach Allan Donald's decision to quit was was also an outcome of the 'race row'.

“It wouldn’t surprise me at all if there’s another story behind his decision. Allan would have earned a lot of money as bowling coach of the national team and I don’t think you just turn your back on that,” De Villiers said.

“Obviously, questions will be raised about what happened at the World Cup and whether the SMS story with Vernon Philander had anything to do with it.”