The XI best Zimbabwe cricket videos on the internet

By Liam Brickhill

As a cricketing nation, Zimbabwe don’t have anywhere near the same currency (monetary or otherwise) as titans such as India or Australia. And in a world now permanently online, that’s as apparent on the Internet as it is outside, out there, in the ‘real’ world. But they’re still a presence, and stake a modest, yet significant claim amid the 300 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute. My research into Zimbabwe’s cricketing history sometimes means digging into some soggy, statty corners of the internet (I’m looking at you, CricketArchive.com), as well as roving through aeons-worth of cricket footage online. Research never looked so much like procrastination, but there are some real gems out there and XI of these I would like to share with you, dear reader. And so, here are my candidates for The XI Best Zimbabwean Cricket Videos on YouTube.

 
11. Repeat after me: Transformation is not a dirty word. Although that process has not been easy or painless (or perfect, and often far from it), that Zimbabwean cricket is a sport transformed is something to celebrate. This is not to pretend that the sport occupies some sort of post-racial utopia. That’s just not the world we live in. But videos like this one are some sort of barometer of the way cricket in the country has come to embed itself across divides of class, race and gender. And that’s something worth smiling about. I’m not going to go all CLR James on you – for starters I lack the intellectual heft and sharpness of wit to even attempt to show this shitty YouTube video in relation to the man’s work, and especially the greatest cricket book ever written – but I will say this: what happens beyond the boundary is as worthy of attention as what happens within it. Just look.

10. When ants unite, they can carry an elephant. That’s exactly what happened on this chilly Cape Town night back in 2007, when a modest Zimbabwean attack carried away an elephantine Aussie top order. Australia were lethargic, Zimbabwe electric, and Brendan Taylor followed up an exemplary night behind the stumps with an unbeaten 60 to see Zimbabwe home in the last over, with just a little rain to add to the drama. This win is all the more incredible given the time it arrived. Three years on from the era-breaking ‘rebel’ saga, this side didn’t even play Tests anymore, and with their country’s economy in freefall and a violent election around the corner, no-one gave Zimbabwe a chance before this game.  

9. Lord’s will soon have an honours board for ODIs, but back in 1999 such a frightful concept would barely have been countenanced. These are the cats who only allowed women in the Long Room in 1997 … But I digress. Here’s a knock that would clearly be deserving. The best part is Warnie’s look of exasperation (‘face like a smacked arse’ is a phrase that springs to mind) as he watches yet another rasping drive curl up the slope to the boundary. My brother was at this match, and it was when Johnson launched into Warne that he, and the other Zimbabweans in the stands, started to believe. There wasn’t quite enough gas in the tank to take Zimbabwe home, and apart from Murray Goodwin, no-one gave Johnno much assistance. Still, this innings, against a team who would be world champions a month later at the same venue, must surely be one of the best in limited overs for Zimbabwe. Johnson finished 132*, and shone throughout this tournament with three man of the match awards, including one for his all-round brilliance against South Africa. Pity he didn’t stick around much longer. 

8. Speaking of Neils, here’s another one whose legend arguably outshines even that of the aforementioned Johnson. To my knowledge, Neil has not missed a match at Harare Sports Club in the last 20 years or so, and anyone who’s watched cricket there will know of his boundless enthusiasm for the game. You can’t help but be gee’d up by him. Here’s a clip of Murehwa at his finest.  Neil’s story, for those who don’t know it, is here.

7. The prowess of Zimbabwean fielding in the 1980s and 90s has been passed into lore, and the side that went to the 1983 World Cup was probably the best fielding unit at the tournament. Apparently there is a ‘when-we’ feeling in some quarters that the commitment to great fielding has waned in recent years, but on this evidence they’re as sharp ever. The star of this clip is the parry, flick and run-out performed by Musakanda, Waller and Chakabva. There isn’t a single wasted movement or effort between the three of them. Musakanda to Waller to Chakabva, a trio of Chevrons, and fleeter than birds (to borrow from Baseball’s Sad Lexicon).

6. Grant Flower 96 v West Indies in 2000. There comes a time in every young man’s life when he feels the first bittersweet pangs of budding love, and must venture forth boldly to proclaim a ‘favourite player’. For me, Grant Flower was that player, and this match was that time. He had a forward defensive to make you weak at the knees (a sentence which probably says as much about me as it does about the textbook quality of his high-elbowed, ye-shall-not-pass, forward poke). Yet two thirds of the way through his career, defence was no longer enough and Flower was forced to change his game, bringing shots he used to play only in the nets out onto the field as he slipped down from opener to no. 6 in both Tests and one day cricket. Flower averaged 29.29 and 33.15 opening in Tests and ODIs respectively, with these numbers nudging up to 30.11 and 34.75 in the middle order, and even further to 34.36 and 50.28 in 27 internationals at no. 6.This knock, with Flower stage-managing an unlikely chase from no. 6, showcases the reinvention of his game. And that’s a mark of a different type of greatness to the colossi of modern batting such as Pietersen, Ponting et al – a different type because it suggests an ability to react, adapt and change with the times. Cricket was beginning to change, and Flower had the forethought and skill to change with it. Nahmsayin?

5. Memories of Henry Olonga’s career are equal parts wonder and anguish. It was often either ‘miracle at Chester-le-Street’ or nought for lots off not so many with this guy, or at least that’s how the story generally goes. Olonga was actually a better bowler than that. Maybe it’s just that the erratic days stand out over the steady, if unexplosive ones. Here we catch Olonga on one of his best days, when pace and precision are in alignment and he scythes through none other than Ganguly, Dravid and Tendulkar, three batsmen who would go on (and on, and on) to aggregate more than 40,000 ODI runs between them, revolutionizing one-day batting along the way to cement their place as the best top three to have ever drawn breath. But not on this night.  

4. If necessity is the mother of invention, what on earth was Douglas Marillier in need of when he invented this shot? Marillier unveiled the shot (which I’ll call ‘the Zimscoop’ from now on) to the world in this game, first freakin’ ball, against Glenn McGrath no less, but it was against India that he really showed its destructive potential. You can almost feel the veins in Zaheer Khan’s temple throb with impotent rage as yet another accurate delivery is scooped to the unlikeliest of boundaries by a gangly, unknown Zimbabwean. This was a shot that Marillier practised at length in the nets, famously losing multiple balls in the gardens next door during club net sessions at Alexandra Sports Club in Harare. That he then took it out and played it against the world’s best fast bowlers in McGrath and Zaheer is testament to genre-bending skill, and perhaps a little craziness too. But it’s not that surprising that a Zimbabwean was playing the paddle-scoop before it was cool. Given the paucity of their resources, Zimbabwe have always been willing to innovate and experiment, being early adopters of the reverse sweep after watching Mushtaq Mohammed play it on a Pakistan International Airways team’s tour of the country in the early 1980s. Dave Houghton played against him and remembers: “Mushtaq Mohammed came and that was the first time I saw it. It was one of those things where you saw it and thought ‘that looks quite handy, I’ll try it’”. Legend has it that Houghton used the shot to bring up his 150, 200 and 250 during his daddy double against Sri Lanka, and he eventually passed the shot on to others like Andy Flower, and the spirit of innovation lever left Zimbabwean batting, from Flower through Whittall, Taibu, Marillier and even current players such as Sean Williams.

3. December 22, 1996: A day that will live in cricketing infamy. Sort of. With England chasing 205 in 37 overs on the final afternoon, Nick Knight and Alec Stewart went into one-day mode, while Heath Streak, following his captain’s orders, kept the ball well outside off, almost always out of the batsman’s reach, skirting as close to the edge of the rule book as he did the pitch. You can hear Ian Botham seething not-so-quietly, off-mic in the commentary box, while coach David Lloyd howled even more loudly in the press. Call it shadenfreude, but Zimbabweans remember this match very fondly. They remember the ODI series that followed (Zimbabwe 3: England 0, murdered ‘em, chicken farming gains worldwide fame) even more so. 

2. Stay with me here, I’ve kind of got to go all around the world for this one. I’ve been writing about cricket in some capacity for more than 14 years now (I’m older than I look, but I use a good moisturizer and drink plenty of water, and so should you). I have my father to thank for the fact that I’m interested in the game at all. He called me in to the lounge (and out of the blissful boredom of youth) to watch the end of Zimbabwe’s win over India at the 99 World Cup: “Come and watch, something amazing is happening.” Seven words to change my life. Olonga’s triple-wicket miracle turned me on to this game, and four years later I was finally old enough to be accredited as a journalist for the 2003 World Cup. I didn’t have a newspaper to write for – surprisingly, pitches from angsty, clueless teenagers don’t get much traction in the offices of the world’s leading media houses – but through my old man’s leftie network I was able to score a gig with The Morning Star, a communist tabloid in London. Partly because he wanted to go to all the matches (for free), and partly to act as my guide (and commissar) as I typed my first words as a cricket writer, my father also wangled media accreditation through the same paper, and we went to all of Zimbabwe’s home games together. My very first cricket writing assignment was to relate the small matter of Andy Flower and Henry Olonga’s black armband protest on the back page of a commie rag that had pictures of American tanks rolling into Baghdad on the front. Heady times indeed. A week or two later we hit the road to cover this match in Bulawayo, and when Andy Blignaut started to light up Queens with a daring assault on the invincible Australians we decided leave the press box and watch the denouement down in the stands. I remember Jason Gillespie’s astonishment as Blignaut brazenly swiped four fours in an over. I remember losing sight of his second six in the endless blue of the Matabeleland sky. I remember the sandals my father was wearing, his hat, his gammy toe. The crinkle in his nose as he squinted in the sun. His chuckles at Blignaut’s bolschy antics. His eye for detail: he pointed out that there were Australians cheering Blignaut’s knock, the sort of detail that helped to bring my match report to life. He’s been gone for three years now, and as difficult as it is to admit, memories of lost loved ones fade with time even as we try to keep hold of them. But when I watch this video, I remember.

1. This one has it all. Build-up, emotion, release. Umm … a soundtrack by Coldplay. Okay, that last bit isn’t so cool, but it fits in the circumstances. Positively orgasmic.This wins the internet EVERY DAY and a significant number of the 29,000 views on this video belong to yours truly. I refuse to be ashamed of that. Play this video at my wedding. Play it at my funeral. Play it every day.

Some honourable mentions:

The Aussie, white-man’s-burdensy touch to this video is laid on a little heavy at times, but it gets a pass purely on the strength of a cute-as-a-button Stuart Matsikenyeri, who went on to play 131 internationals for Zimbabwe.

Possibly Heath Streak’s finest day in a red shirt. While he’s got more meat on him than a butcher’s shop in the Free State and looks like he could slug a cricket ball clear out of a stadium, Streak’s pretensions as a batter were in reality loftier still, metaphorically speaking, and it was in the rearguard that he often found his groove. On a venomous SCG track, he top-scores with a patient 45 before returning to wreak havoc with the ball, taking 4 for 8. All round perfection.

There are millionaire, world-famous cricketers who WISH they could drive as well as Vusi Sibanda. This rasping cover drive IS mindsex.

More Sibanda. Who said Zimbabwe are no longer the fielding side they once were? Please shush, sit down. And watch this.

The first time Zimbabwe meets (and beats) England in an international match. They’d retain their dominance over the English for almost a decade after this.

Enjoy these short highlights, and especially the high-pitched scream presumably emitted by one of the grown-ass, burly men on the field when Kallis nicks behind for 0 (4) .

Peak Andy Flower.

Hate mail, marriage proposals and your own personal favourites can be directed to my Twitter feed, @gomorezvidinha. Next week, I’ll share the videos where things didn’t work out quite so well. An array of hat-tricks, slip-ups, collisions and drops awaits…

What’s the most you’ve ever lost on a coin toss?

 

“What’s the most you’ve ever lost on a coin toss?”

Anton Chigurh, the dark agent of destruction in Cormac McCarthy’s No Country For Old Men asks that question to an unwitting petrol attendant in the novel’s second chapter, coercing the man into staking his life on a coin toss. Chigurh’s nihilistically poetic ramblings about fate and free will darken the underbelly of the novel. Life’s a game of certain rules to him, and players gotta play.

Agency and chance are concepts deeply embedded in the human condition, and their expression can be as eloquent in sport as it is in art. They’d certainly be in the mind, one way or another, of a batsman dug in on the fifth day of a Test match, fending at deliveries pitching in the rough that may or may not spit off that crack, or miss the indent and shoot through at his shins. The symbolic gesture of the coin toss, central to Chigurh’s character, is also a fitting prelude to the game of cricket, the laws of which it has been part of since 1744. If you’ll allow me the room to extend the metaphor a little and quote from NCFOM again, the coin toss in cricket is a way of saying “alright, I’ll be a part of this world”.

One hundred times, a Zimbabwean has called or tossed a coin for his team in a Test match, on four continents and in the Caribbean, under skies familiar and foreign, from the clear blue of a Bulawayo morning to grey mizzle of Manchester and the dessicating dome of Peshawar. A flicked thumb, a silver disk spinning up into the ether, a handshake. This has been the smash-cut prologue to the full spectrum of Zimbabwe’s Test history.

It’s a Test history that provides as rich a narrative as any McCarthy novel. McCarthy or Masakadza, in both worlds, people are tested in extreme situations. At twenty four years, Zimbabwe’s Test history is still adolescent in the game’s lengthy history, but the Zimbabweans have packed a lot of drama into those two decades.

Many were surprised when Zimbabwe became the ninth Test nation in July 1992, not the least of which were the Zimbabweans themselves. Months prior to the announcement, Zimbabwe’s professional cricketers had voted, virtually unanimously, to re-join the South African domestic system. Dave Houghton, Zimbabwe’s first Test captain, says that when the Zimbabwean side of the 1980s (captained by Duncan Fletcher with Peter Rawson open the bowling, John Traicos holding up an end and Graeme Hick waiting in the wings) drifted apart he thought Zimbabwe’s case for Test status went with them. When Zimbabwe did get the chance to play at the top level, were they even good enough? He’s not so sure, and tells a hilarious story to illustrate the point.

“I’ll tell you how bare the cupboards were … “

On the eve of Zimbabwe’s inaugural Test against India in Harare, a historic occasion in cricketing history, the home squad gathered. “So we’re at this team dinner,” says Houghton. “We’re not drinking much. I think we had a glass of wine. The Chairman is there and he wishes us good luck, we all get up from the table and Ali Shah comes round to Hamps [coach John Hampshire] and says ‘I think I’ve pulled my hamstring.’ 10 o’clock at night, and we start at 10 tomorrow morning. So Hamps, once the disappointment has subsided, sits down [Ed: with a strong Scotch I hope] and says ‘who’s going to play’? Our 12^th man was literally a twelfth man  – he was a nice young kid who could field, but he certainly couldn’t bat or bowl in a Test match. Or in any game. So we racked our brains and the best we could come up with was a guy called Gary Crocker, who was a left-arm medium pace swing bowler and left-handed batsman with a good eye. He’d played a bit of golf for the country and a bit of softball. One problem was that he lived in Bulawayo [800 kilometres away] and it’s now 10 o’clock the night before the game. We thought ‘well, we’ve got to get him here’. So we phoned his house and there was no reply. We phoned someone who knew him and they said they knew exactly where he was – him and his missus were at a party.  So we phoned there, got hold of Crocker’s missus and asked:

‘Can I speak to Gary? Is he okay?’

‘Ja ja ja, he’s fine.’

So he came on the line and we said:

‘Gary, listen, we’ve got this problem. Can you get to Harare for a Test match tomorrow?’

“And he says ‘gee that’s going to be a problem’, because he’s had a lot to drink. But then he says actually his missus, Shelly, hadn’t drunk so much so she could drive. He says

‘Okay no problem, I’ll be there.’

“So we all went off to bed hoping Gary would be there in time. The story then goes that he’d had a few beers at the party and was quite horny at the time, and he reckoned they’d stopped two or three times on the side of the road to satisfy his horniness. He got to Harare at about five in the morning, got to the ground in time for the warm-up and everything after about two or three hours sleep. Fortunately we won the toss and batted so he could have a kip in the change room. But that, despite the funny element of the story, gives you an idea of how short-staffed we were in terms of cricketers. We couldn’t find a cricketer in the whole of Harare to replace an allrounder.”

The next morning, Houghton walked out in his blazer to meet Indian captain Mohammad Azharrudin to toss the coin that brought a hungover Gary Crocker his Test debut; that debuted a nation. Alright, I’ll be a part of this world.

“It was an anxious moment,” says Houghton. “I went out to toss the coin with Azharrudin. There was a good crowd, because it was an immense occasion. I think the coin we used is in the museum there.”

Houghton became Zimbabwe’s first Test centurion in that match, which Zimbabwe drew, and despite his early worries Zimbabwe remained a Test side until their hiatus in 2006. Houghton still holds the record for Zimbabwe’s highest Test score, 266 against Sri Lanka. He brought up that double with a reverse sweep, which is a shot that has a strong lineage in Zimbabwe. Andy Flower, another of Zimbabwe’s Test double centurions, used it often in his own 232 not out against India. In total, four Zimbabweans have passed 200 in a Test match, though Guy Whittall remains the only one to have done so while fiendishly hungover . Houghton has a hand in that story too: he was player/coach of the national side, and he’d moved the under-performing Whittall up to no. 4 against New Zealand at Queens Sports Club in 1997, with the caveat that this was Whittall’s last crack at the Test side, should he not score well.

“So I said, ‘Okay Dave thanks very much’, and went and drank a bottle of Scotch that night with my cousin Andrew Whittall and a good friend of mine, Brendan Dawson [ who played rugby for Zimbabwe],” explains Whittall. “I was pretty fortunate that Brendan and my cousin managed to get me to the ground, which is not something I’m very proud of, but I had so many things going through my life. All sorts of problems, cricket-related, girlfriends. Everything was just an issue in life.”

“And I went out there, and I’ll never forget … I was driving a ball and I would chip it over cover, I went to hook and it went over slip. Everything went in the air, just over fielders. Flem [New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming] and Parore and the boys were giving me lots of stick. Next thing I closed the day on 60. And on the previous night Brendan had said ‘Guy, if you get a hundred tomorrow, I’ll give you a grand’, because he didn’t think it was possible. “

The following day, with only no. 11 Everton Matambanadzo for company for more than an hour, Whittall did more than that: passing 100, he brought up his double ton with an edge through the slips. Did Dawson pay him the thousand dollars?

“Yeah, but then he doubled it. Double or quits. He still hasn’t paid me, the chop.”

Whittall’s first Test hundred, under less bleary-eyed circumstances, had come two years previously in a match that remains Zimbabwe’s finest team performance over the course of a game: their very first Test win, against Pakistan at home in 1995. That game’s many major achievements, starting with the toss, bear repeating.

Andy Flower, now captain, somehow managed to burgle the toss that allowed Zimbabwe to bat first, setting the scene for a historic win. It seems Pakistan captain Salim Malik, upon spying the Zimbabwe bird symbol imprinted on the local currency, called ‘bird’ at the toss instead of ‘heads’. When the coin landed heads up, Flower leaned over to congratulate Malik on winning but match referee Jackie Hendriks said he’d not heard the call and demanded a second toss, which Flower won, deciding to bat.

(That’s not even the weirdest toss Malik has been involved in. Indeed, he was part of a toss incident that resulted in all international coin tosses being supervised by a match referee! Before an ODI against New Zealand in Wellington, Kiwi captain Ken Rutherford spun the coin and Malik called in Urdu and then claimed the toss. “I’d been stuffed good and proper,” Rutherford is said to have exclaimed, and so he reversed the charges in the next game, outright claiming a toss that it seemed Malik had won. Not really cricket, is it? And so the law was changed, and all future tosses happened under supervision. )

After an early batting wobble against Aqib Javed and Wasim Akram, Andy and his brother Grant methodically assembled Zimbabwe’s highest batting partnership, overtaking Greg and Ian Chappell’s fraternal partnership record in the process. Andy made 156 and Grant, dropped in the 20s and on 98, made 201 not out. Whittall topped up the scorecard with 113 and Henry Olonga, the first black African to play Test cricket (which would make this match historic all on its own), marked the occasion of his first delivery by tearing in to bowl four wides, then a searing bouncer, and then had Saeed Anwar caught down the leg side fending off his hip with his third. He was dramatically called for throwing later in the game, a gut-punch that Olonga elaborated upon in his book, but Zimbabwe weathered the blow thanks to Heath Streak’s career best effort with the ball, a 6 for 90 that brought a win in four days, by an innings and 164 runs – still Zimbabwe’s largest victory in Tests.

That win continues to resonate, with poignancy, yes, considering all Zimbabwe’s troubles, but also with pride. This team has made a worthy contribution to a venerated game. They’ve told a good story. Their shenanigans to draw a Test against England despite being flippin’ murdered, the Lords debacle in 2003, Ridley Jacobs’ obduracy as Zimbabwe came within a wicket of a win later that year, the infamous 54 all out at Newlands, a six-year hiatus, a dramatic comeback win against Bangladesh, the jubilation of overcoming Misbah’s Pakistan in Zimbabwe’s narrowest Test win three years ago, the heartbreak in Harare against Sri Lanka in the 100th Test, the doubles, the five-fors, the ducks, the drops. It’s a colourful patchwork.

They’ve been a generous Test team, ushering both Courtney Walsh and Muttiah Muralitharan past Test bowling records (Murali can also thank them for his 9 for 51 at Kandy in 2002 and for six five-wicket and two 10-wicket hauls overall) and providing the throwdowns for Matty Hayden’s 380 at the WACA in ‘03. They’ve produced a player, the steel-jawed Andy Flower, who was ranked the best on the planet in his craft.

There’s room for progress yet. No women have captained Zimbabwe in a Test match and had the honour of tossing that coin – the women’s side only plays limited overs cricket. Only 11 of Zimbabwe’s one hundred Test XIs have been led by black men. One day that distinction won’t (and shouldn’t) matter any more, but today it still does. That takes no honour away from Graeme Cremer’s current position – he’s part of a history he’s had no control over, and he’s earned the job, looks the part, and has the backing of his team. The game has grown in Zimbabwe, and needs to continue to grow.

Cremer tossed Zimbabwe’s hundredth Test coin on Saturday, setting in motion the events that led to his maiden Test hundred. He was very nearly the rearguard hero Zimbabwe needed to save the match. If he hadn’t stepped down the track to Rangana Herath with just 11 overs to go. If the Umpires’ erratic decisions had been correct. If those mistakes hadn’t come in the midst of a wheels-off, eyes-closed batting collapse. If the rain had settled in. Zimbabwe might have drawn this one. Their 100th Test was a bittersweet milestone. But it was also a gripping contest, with toil and comedy and hope and tragedy – and a good story, and that’s something worth continuing to toss that coin for.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why the ICC changes could save Zimbabwe cricket

The first Test against New Zealand may have been a largely depressing experience for Zimbabwe, but it was also helpful in the perspective that it offered.

Because while it can be difficult to judge a side’s value or trajectory when you’re trying to compare their performances against different opposition in different venues, here we had the opportunity to compare apples with apples.

Nearly five years ago, Zimbabwe met New Zealand at the same venue and very nearly beat them. Now they were only spared total humiliation by a superb innings from Sean Williams, and still lost by an innings and 117 runs. The 2011 game was one of the best Test matches that I’ve witnessed live. This was one of the worst that I’ve sat through on TV.

The discrepancy offered an opportunity to reflect on everything that has happened over the past five years, and provide some answers on how Zimbabwe got here.

It reminded us that over the past five years: Zimbabwe as a country has returned from the relative stability of 2011 to something approaching ‘rock bottom’; domestic cricket has gone from a functional setup with overseas pros to a poor one that provides very little cricket; we’ve lost our best batsman and our best bowler to County cricket; the national team no longer has the stability of the Alan Butcher technical team, and is instead being run by a novice coach with no qualifications supported only by a batting coach who works part time; selection has become even more haphazard, with chief selector Tatenda Taibu barely present.

In short, a system that was holding its own in 2011 has slowly disintegrated and now broken down into total chaos.

To my mind, there are two possible ways in which the future might play out.

The first is what Dav Whatmore predicted last week, which is for Zimbabwe to go the way of Kenya, following it into financial oblivion. More players would leave, fixtures would become even harder to come by and the rest of the cricket world would give up on us entirely. Whatmore is not the only person to make this prediction recently – several other well-informed commentators (who don’t have an axe to grind with ZC) have done so in private.

The other option is to accept our place in the world and ride the waves of change that are rolling through world cricket. If we do, the long-term future could look quite bright.

The ICC have before them a range of proposals that I believe could be hugely beneficial to Zimbabwe. The idea as it stands is to split Test cricket into two tiers, form a new ODI league made up of the top 13 teams, and create a common pool for TV rights money.

Last week ZC chairman Tavengwa Mukuhlani told me about the issues that he and the board have with the proposal. “Our view as Zimbabwe Cricket, and I believe it’s the view of any other weaker nation who is trying to improve their game, is that by not exposing our team to good opposition we are not going to improve,” he said. “Whatever restructuring of international cricket is done must be aimed at ensuring that it improves cricket and our belief is that you can only improve when you play against the best.”

There is no doubt that having a two-tier Test system will be harsh on the countries who narrowly miss out on the top tier, and for that reason Bangladesh deserve some sympathy. They’ve recently shown admirable improvement, and going back to only playing weaker sides would be detrimental  – although only in the short term, since the system would have promotion and relegation.

But since that New Zealand Test in 2011, Zimbabwe have played just 12 Tests, five of which were against Bangladesh. So that’s seven Tests against supposed top-tier teams in five years.

The innings defeat to New Zealand proved that that isn’t working – you can’t play intermittent Test cricket and expect to improve, regardless of who it’s against.

Zimbabwe would undoubtedly benefit more from playing eight Tests against relative equals every two years (as the ICC proposal for Division Two has it) than holding on for seven Tests against the top teams every five. It’s also worth noting that, unless Zimbabwe pull out of their current nose-dive, they would be lucky to get another seven over the next five years.

Furthermore, if the ODI league went ahead then the national team would still have the chance to play against the top teams in the world on a regular basis and learn from the experience. And fans in Zimbabwe would have a much better chance of seeing the world’s top players in the flesh than they do right now.

Finally, given that Zimbabwe’s games have not even featured on SuperSport of late, denying many Zimbabweans both in Zim and South Africa the opportunity to watch the team, a new broadcast arrangement would also be a good thing since it would see broadcasters essentially buying a package for all international cricket. ZC would have guaranteed income, and supporters would be guaranteed to see the games on TV (which is clearly not the case with ZTV, even when they have the rights).

So rather than grandstanding, ZC should be focusing their attention on how to keep Zimbabwe cricket afloat until 2019, when the changes would come into effect. Because the way things are going at the moment, that feels a long, long way away.

Interview: ZC chairman Tavengwa Mukuhlani

Zimbabwe Cricket are in a tight spot. The national team’s decline has continued, the domestic game is horribly weak and the administration is carrying a crippling debt. Former coach Dav Whatmore has predicted that Zimbabwe is going the way of Kenya – a sentiment that many other well-informed commentators (who have less of an axe to grind than Whatmore) have also expressed in private.

Last August, Tavengwa Mukuhlani was appointed chairman of ZC as Wilson Manase lost his seat on the board. Mukuhlani is not new to the ZC board – he was vice-chairman for much of the 2000s, and played a key role in the ‘rebel’ saga.

Tristan Holme spoke to him to find out how he plans to revive cricket in Zimbabwe, and his thoughts on the ICC proposal to split Test cricket into two tiers. Mukuhlani explained the reservations that ZC have about that proposal, and revealed that there are major changes afoot in the domestic game this coming summer. The interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

What would you say is the state of cricket in Zimbabwe at the moment?
The state of cricket in Zimbabwe has been deteriorating for a couple of years now. It’s been going on a downward trend for a couple of years. So yes, it’s not in good shape.

What are some of the challenges that you have faced, coming in as the new ZC chairman?
Zimbabwe Cricket is in a bad financial state. The team has not been performing well. Our development programmes are not running as they should be, and our domestic cricket is not in the state that it should be.

That’s a pretty comprehensive package of things that are not running well. What are your plans to turn it all around?
You would have noticed that we have moved from franchise cricket to go back to provincial cricket. The reason is that we want to get our provinces to be in charge of running cricket, so that they run development programmes in their respective areas. We had five franchises that were reduced to four, and the funding model was such that money was going into the franchises and then the franchises would take care of the development programmes for the provinces. That programme did not go as planned.

Also at the time when the idea of franchise cricket was brought up, it was thought that they would become stand-alone entities which would be bought by businesspeople who invest in these teams and then run them independently, rather than being run by ZC. That also did not materialise. So when we came in we looked at the model and said that we’re not capable of financing that model because we don’t have the money. So we went back to the original system where cricket is run at provincial level and provinces take charge of all the cricketing activities in their provinces.

Does that mean that there won’t be any franchise cricket this season?
We will have our competitions, but at provincial level. We have split the provinces into a two-tier system where we have four first-class provinces that are playing the four-day game, and we have got six Associate provinces that are playing a lower league by virtue of them not being very well developed. Bulawayo Metropolitan, Harare Metropolitan, Midlands and Manicaland are our first-class provinces. The rest will play in our Associate leagues, which are already being played – currently we are having our 50-over competition, which is called the Zimbabwe Premier League. The main idea is that if we are to have franchise cricket, we must have external investment along the same lines as the Indian Premier League, but at the moment we are not doing that because we don’t have the capacity to finance it.

Will the Associate provinces still play three-day cricket?
We have put together a proposal that is still to be approved by the provinces of a 12-month cricket season. They are yet to have a look and see how it works within their plans and give their input. But what we have realised is that our cricket season was short, and it was getting even shorter. Maybe because of financial constraints, I don’t know, but you found that leagues were not being finished. Games were not coming to an end. So we have said we must have a longer season. We have proposed 12 months, but we’ll see what the provinces come back with – they may say we should make it nine months. It’s a discussion. But our desire is to play more cricket at the lower level.

And does the proposal include three-day cricket among Associate provinces?
Yes, it does.

Obviously the difficulty of playing more cricket is that it costs more money. Is ZC in a financial position where they can do that, given the debt that you are carrying?
We have to make a choice. It’s either we are not playing cricket and we close shop, or we find a funding mechanism. We must find a funding mechanism to play cricket. You will notice that we are going through a restructuring that has involved laying off and severe salary cuts. The whole idea is to plough those savings back into funding domestic cricket programmes.

Are the national contracts likely to be worth less when they are handed out in the coming months as you try to save a bit more money?
The restructuring that has taken place so far has not touched the technical staff – that’s your coaches – at any level. It has not touched the players at any level. We will obviously be going into a contract review for the players – that is a process that we have started. The technical team and a panel of experts will advise the board as to the number of contracts that they think are feasible to have, and to the level of grading.

Is your hope that you’ll be able to give domestic cricketers something closer to a 12-month contract, rather than what you had before where they were only contracted for around five months of the year?
I think some will even get longer contracts of two, three or even four years. The discussions we have had with the players have suggested they are agreeable to it. So some players will get four-year contracts and some will get three-year contracts. That’s at all levels. It is a comprehensive exercise that will look at all levels.

The figure that is going around at the moment is that ZC are $19m in debt. Can you confirm that?
We have been servicing our debt. Off the cuff I can’t give you the figure, but the liabilities in terms of loans, yes they are at $19m. But they have been significantly reduced over time because we have been servicing the debt. We are looking at how best we can manage this in a sustainable way going forward.

At the ICC level, you have potential changes with the idea to adopt a two-tier Test system as well as a changed revenue model. Are ZC in favour of that?
I can’t give a direct comment on that because it is a discussion that is going on. The ICC board has not yet made a decision as to which way we are going with the restructuring of international cricket, but as you’ve rightly pointed out there is a proposal on the table. We have our views on that, but nothing concrete has come out of that proposal.

But having said that, our view as Zimbabwe Cricket, and I believe it’s the view of any other weaker nation who is trying to improve their game, is that by not exposing our team to good opposition we are not going to improve. Whatever restructuring of international cricket is done must be aimed at ensuring that it improves cricket and our belief is that you can only improve when you play against the best. If you have some teams playing against weaker sides always, as is the case for some sides now – Zimbabwe has only been playing against Bangladesh previously, and we’ve played Afghanistan and Hong Kong – there is no way that cricket in Zimbabwe is going to develop.

Cricket can only develop if everyone plays the other, and if the weaker nations have an opportunity to play the bigger nations. That’s our view – we need the exposure. Like we have New Zealand coming to play with us, and that’s the only way we can develop. If India visit, that’s the only way we can develop. To have a situation where the smaller nations play alone, I’m not too sure whether that will develop cricket and bring any value to the game. So we will make our presentations and give our view to the proposal.

Some people might point out that Zimbabwe hasn’t played a Test match for almost two years, and so at least the new system would guarantee a certain number of matches – and that hopefully those matches would be paid for by the ICC’s new finance structure.
There was a time when the Champions Trophy was in England and Zimbabwe did not travel because of the tension between Harare and London, and Scotland played in their stead [actually the 2009 World Twenty20]. Zimbabwe would have been compensated, monetarily or otherwise. But I’ll tell you what. There is no amount of money that will be able to replace the experience that the boys will have by playing Test cricket against Australia. The only way for the boys to develop is to play the bigger nations. If we focus on the monetary value that is going to come out of it, I don’t think we’ll be able to develop the game of cricket. I still believe there must be a number of games that weaker nations must play against bigger nations.

Everyone talks of Afghanistan having improved. It’s not because they were playing Oman, the UAE, Nepal and other Associates continuously. It’s because we also, as a Full Member, have given them game time, and they’ve taken experience out of that. Even for the Full Members, it’s important that those who are ranked lower continue to play the higher ranked sides so that we continue to improve. And everyone who says Afghanistan has improved has not yet exposed their team to Afghanistan. Afghanistan has only played one Full Member in a bilateral series and that is Zimbabwe. So I’m of the opinion that there must be exposure at all levels for everyone. That’s the only way that we can develop cricket. I’m fully aware that there is a financial implication in terms of having equality, but we must try to find a balance between the commercial aspect and the cricket aspect.

Speaking of the Associates, Dav Whatmore told me that there is a reluctance within ZC to play against the Associates because there is a feeling that if Zimbabwe loses to them then it won’t look good. Is there any truth in that?
I don’t think there is truth in that. Zimbabwe has played more games against Associate nations than any other Full Member. So to say that Zimbabwe is reluctant to play against the Associates for fear of losing is not true. It’s unfortunate. It’s an issue of funding and he’s well aware of that. If you take Australia A and Scotland, who would choose to play between the two? So we are also alive to the fact that we must play the best possible opponent, rather than just play for the sake of fulfilling the fixture. The games must be beneficial to both sides. If we go and play Namibia tomorrow we see very little benefit to our players. If we bring Australia A, India A, Sri Lanka A, England A or West Indies A then there is benefit to our players. We are guided by that. So it’s not that we are avoiding the Associates, but rather we are looking at what will be most beneficial. Remember we have limited resources.

You appointed Makhaya Ntini as coach on an interim basis. Are you any closer to appointing someone on a full-time basis?
The board hasn’t advised me of anything but I would want to believe that they are working around something. They are observing what is happening and they will give me the directive.

Several players I’ve spoken to have suggested that they’re not enjoying his methods.
[Laughs] Players will always be players. We do listen to players – it’s important that we do – but we must find a balance between the players becoming cry babies and finding reasons for not performing, and also genuine concern.

Was there any concern about Makhaya’s lack of qualifications when he was appointed?
Dav won the World Cup with Sri Lanka, he went to Bangladesh, he went to Pakistan, he’s been with India Under-19 and with the academy and all that. And Afghanistan had Inzamam-ul-Haq and that was his first assignment. The results are a world apart. So I think we need to give Makhaya the benefit and support him. International experience can not be understated; he was a top performer. I think he can be useful to the youngsters, and to his credit I think there has been some improvement in our bowling. We have brought in Lance Klusener who should be able to cover the batting.

But as I say the board is taking a closer look at that and will make a decision based on what they’ve seen. He has only been in charge for the India series. The T20 series was a very close series which could have gone either way. Not that I’m saying he should be the next coach, it’s obviously dependant on what the board wants to do. But I think the issue of him not having coached before must not be a big issue.

About The Book

Of all the Test nations, few possess such a remarkable story as Zimbabwe.

After all, who else can claim to have emerged from a civil war, built the game up on the back of cake sales and beer fests, beaten Australia in their first ODI, achieved Test status against all the odds and become everyone’s favourite underdog, only to implode in such a spectacular fashion that, less than 40 years after it all began, the game’s future has been left hanging by a thread?

In 2013, Tristan Holme and Liam Brickhill began the journey of documenting this rich history since independence: a history threaded by a kaleidoscope of stories and characters. The motivation for the project was two-fold: firstly, the stories are highly readable; secondly, they are stories that need to be told.

The 1980s saw a group of happy-go-lucky amateurs build the game up through selfless dedication, and the 1990s brought professionalism and overachievement on a grand scale, culminating in qualification for the Super Six stage of 1999 World Cup.

But the early 2000s saw rising tension between a largely white establishment and increasingly frustrated black stakeholders, which came to a head when 15 ‘rebel’ players walked away from the game in 2004.

In the wake of that fractious episode, cricket transformed from its white, colonial base to a truly national sport – a transition to be celebrated but one that, like Zimbabwe’s land grab, was fraught with difficulty.

Indeed, cricket is a game that tends to reflect the country around it – very rarely does it exist in a bubble, and so its relevance is all the greater. But this is particularly true in the case of Zimbabwe.

In the years that followed the ‘rebel’ saga, as hyperinflation gripped the nation and emptied the state coffers, Zimbabwe Cricket sunk from a healthy financial position to a disastrous one from which it has never recovered. Where did the money go, and who was to blame? More than a decade on, satisfactory answers are still conspicuous by their absence.

Our administrators have sat in the Long Room at Lord’s and met the Queen, but they have also been arrested in their offices, slapped with travel bans and engaged in fisticuffs in front of the Harare Sports Club pavilion.

Our cricketers have gone months without being paid, commuted hundreds of kilometres from farms or hitched rides in kombis just to attend practices, and have also visited far-flung corners of the world and been feted as superstars by foreign crowds.

Zimbabwe’s story is utterly compelling in its contradictions. Has any other cricket team ever soared so high, and sunk so low?

 

About The Authors

Having followed cricket in Zimbabwe for most of their young lives, and reported on it for a wide variety of publications over the past decade, Tristan Holme and Liam Brickhill are among the most knowledgeable journalists in the field.

Both are freelance writers who grew up in Zimbabwe following cricket avidly, before their careers saw them follow the game around the world.

Tristan‘s love for cricket was formed at Lilfordia School just outside of Harare. Since studying English Literature and Media Studies at the University of Cape Town, where he graduated in 2005, he has worked as a sports journalist across a range of media, covering two Cricket World Cups and countless bilateral tours in four different countries (Zimbabwe, South Africa, India and New Zealand).

As a freelancer he has written for, among others, the Wisden Almanack, the Sunday Times (SA), ESPNCricinfo, The Cricket Monthly, Sports Illustrated (SA and India), Associated Press, Wisden india and The National (UAE), and covers all incoming cricket tours to Zimbabwe for AFP. He was also a contributor to Peter May’s book, The Rebel Tours, for which he conducted research and interviewed former players and administrators in South Africa.

He now lives in Cape Town, but travels home to Zimbabwe several times a year to cover cricket and spend time in the bush. He is also a rock climber, and budding permaculturalist.

Liam was born in Zimbabwe to politically active parents, Pat and Paul Brickhill, in 1983. His parents ran a bookshop, Grassroots Books (which later became the Book Café), that stocked a wide variety of left-wing literature. Having spent his formative years scurrying around its aisles, Liam taught himself to read well before he started Grade One in Harare. His father would often take Liam to cricket matches during the early 1990s, when Zimbabwe had become the ninth Test-playing nation, but his epiphanic conversion to the game came in the midst of Henry Olonga’s triple-wicket miracle against India at the 1999 World Cup.

Liam was a rookie journalist in the Harare Sports Club press box when Olonga and Andy Flower made their famous black armband protest at the 2003 World Cup, and by 2004 he was writing for Wisden. He went on to complete a BA (Hons) in Journalism and English Literature at Rhodes University, where he won an academic scholarship and was included on the Dean’s List in his final two years.

He worked on both the London and Bangalore ESPN editorial desks before going freelance in 2012, and also writes about music, culture and festivals. He has written for Mail & Guardian, Sports Illustrated, Associated Press, ESPNcricinfo, Cricket365, Teamtalk Media, The Zimbabwean, Harare News, The Herald, Newsday, The Daily News, The Morning Star, The Cricketer magazine, The Street Seen, and Getaway Magazine. He divides his time between Harare and Cape Town, where he also volunteers with a Refugee Rights organisation.

About This Blog

We like Zimbabwe cricket. A lot. It’s why we’re putting together a book about it, and why we keep writing about it at every opportunity.

Unfortunately, as Zimbabwe’s standing in cricket has slid, so has editors’ interest in commissioning articles on what is happening.

This blog will therefore serve as an outlet for our thoughts and insights on what is happening in Zimbabwe cricket. There will be comment on the national team’s performances in international cricket, on what is happening behind the scenes in Zimbabwe, how the changing times in the world game will affect Zimbabwe as well as discussions with players and administrators.

As the book develops, we will also post teasers on what you can expect. And there will be updates on when the book will be published and where and how it will be available.

Should you wish to contact us, you can do so on Twitter. Tristan tweets @tristanholme and Liam is @Gomorezvidinha.

If Twitter is not your thing, please leave a comment below with your details and we’ll get back to you.