“It’s the passion and love for the game throughout the country.” – Wanele Mngomezulu, the men’s under-19 World Cup tournament director, on what makes the country an excellent host.
Telford Vice / Mangaung Oval
MANY know it as Danny Boy. It started life as Londonderry Air. Whatever, the song has become the quintessential sound of Irishness wherever it is played. Including beyond the northern boundary at Bloemfontein’s Mangaung Oval on Monday, when the unmistakable strains lilted into the heavy air of a hot afternoon from a trumpet and a pair of chunky xylophones.
If you’re South African, this will not surprise you. Trying to make cricket teams from everywhere feel at home is part of what the country does best. If that means playing a song from far away on unfamiliar instruments, so be it.
South Africa struggles with many problems, including lingering racism from the apartheid era, chronic economic inequality, more than its fair share of violent crime, widespread corruption up to government level and an often interrupted supply of electricity. But it is not short on hospitality and know-how.
The ICC announced on November 21 last year that the men’s under-19 World Cup had been taken away from Sri Lanka because of SLC’s suspension due to government interference. Fifty-eight days later, on Friday, West Indies’ Nathan Edward bowled the first ball to South Africa’s Lhuan-dre Pretorius in Potchefstroom at the same time Ireland’s Reuben Wilson did to the US’ Pranav Chettipalayam in Bloem. By Sunday, East London and Kimberley had also hosted games. Benoni will come on board next Wednesday. The 16 competing teams will have played 41 matches when the final is decided in Benoni on February 11.
Monday’s game in Bloem was between Ireland and Bangladesh, hence the choice of music. We will have to forgive the Free State’s finest trumpet and xylophone ensemble for not being up to speed with what tops the playlists in Dhaka these days.
But turn on your television in the coming days and you will see what looks like a match in an ICC tournament, with all its branding bells and whistles. You will not see the 58 days of frantic work put in by CSA, ICC and broadcast staff to make it look like that. Wanele Mngomezulu, CSA’s chief marketing officer who is serving as tournament director, told reporters in Bloem on Monday that he was satisfied: “We’ve had one or two challenges, which we’re getting on top of. But overall we’re happy.”
So far, the only noticeable sign of something going wrong has been the power going down in the outside broadcast van early in Bangladesh’s reply at Mangaung Oval on Monday, which interrupted play for eight minutes. When you endure outages of between two hours and six hours on most days, as South Africans do, eight minutes is nothing.
But 13 means something. For some it’s an unlucky number. For cricketminded South Africans it’s an affirmation of how adept and efficient the country is at hosting major tournaments despite its difficulties and sometimes at short notice. The men’s under-19 World Cup is the 13th big event seen here from the 1998 version of the same bunfight came to town.
That was followed by the 2003 men’s World Cup, the 2005 women’s World Cup, the 2007 men’s World T20, the men’s World Cup qualifiers, the Champions Trophy and the IPL — all in 2009 — the 2010 and 2012 editions of the Champions League T20, the 2020 men’s under-19 World Cup, the inaugural women’s under-19 World Cup and the women’s T20 World Cup, both last year. The 2009 IPL and the 2012 Champions League T20 were, like the current tournament, moved to South Africa at the drop of a floppy hat.
What makes a place where so much goes wrong good at stepping into the breach when a high-profile cricket tournament looms? “It’s the passion and love for the game throughout the country,” Mngomezulu said. “It’s not just about what happens on the field. It’s about the people who support the game, and the fan perspective — the schools and the different partners, and the sporting nation itself. That’s the best testament to how we’re able to do this in a short space of time.”
Friday’s match was played to a backdrop of beaming, buzzing and occasionally booming schoolchildren, who were back at Mangaung Oval for the game between India and Bangladesh on Saturday — when they were joined on the grass banks by a sizeable contingent of the region’s Bangladeshi community. Fewer fans were in attendance to see Bangladesh beat Ireland by six wickets. But, as Mngomezulu said: “It’s a Monday. Schools are back. Everybody’s back at work.”
If the match was played in India, doubtless several thousand would have been in the ground. But South Africa doesn’t have the chaos that compounds the complications of hosting cricket in India, and to a lesser extent in other Asian countries. South Africa also isn’t tangled in the red tape that ties up everything organised in England, Australia and New Zealand, and it doesn’t have the travel and logistical issues that can blight playing in the Caribbean.
What South Africa does have is enough decent cricket grounds and, more importantly, enough people who take pride in running them properly. Yes, Newlands was a mess for the Test against India at the start of the month. Yes, CSA’s flaccid handling of the David Teeger affair is one of many hashes they have made over the years. No, that doesn’t mean the game is irretrievably damaged in this country, as many on social media would have you believe.
“That’s the beauty of South African cricket, that each province has two or three facilities that can host international matches,” Mngomezulu said. “Not all of them will be A grade, but they are trying to put their best foot forward. East London is classified B grade, but they are making efforts to try and ensure that they do attract international matches. Free State have put in a lot to get back into the top class — the facilities and surroundings, and by working closely with hotels because that’s a contributing factor in hosting these matches.”
In short, everybody learns. That’s important because, as the smart branding around the grounds hosting matches reminds us, the event is about cricket’s “future stars”. And about future bar, restaurant and hotel managers. “It’s key for us that we have tournaments like this,” Mngomezulu said. “It’s also about development and ensuring we have sufficient talent coming through to the national set-ups. Tournaments like this give us a view of what’s to come.”
And of what’s past. The xylophone, for instance, which made its way from southeast Asia to Africa in around the year 500 of the common area. Danny Boy will never be the same.
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