Television sport addicts are really spoilt for choice aren’t they? Name your preference and at the touch of a button there it is on your screen in glorious high definition. If you’re a cricket fan for example, you can watch five-day Test cricket, four-day cricket, 50-over cricket, 20-twenty cricket, day-night cricket, interminable IPL cricket, documentaries on cricket, legends of cricket and cricket coming out of your ears. You name it, you’ve got it virtually 24 hours a day.
Some people say life’s too short for Test cricket but this format still draws capacity crowds at venues all over the world and there are those of us here in SA who are looking forward to the up-coming Ashes series between Australia and England in Australia later this year.
Despite the often rabid one-eyed outlook of some of the Aussie commentators, it will be riveting stuff. The laid-back style of the English commentators, will placate any ill-feeling. These men and women for the most part harbour little bias, give credit where it’s due and condemnation where it’s justified. They thrive on humorous banter and above all, have an over-riding sense of the game’s traditions.
With the incomparable Australian Richie Benaud and Queenstown born and bred, Tony Greig (both rated among the game’s 10 best-ever commentators) now happily plying their trade on heaven’s equivalent of Lord’s and another cricket hall of famer, Bill Lawrie now retired, commentary boxes worldwide are somewhat bereft of elegance and charm and instead are packed with former cricketers, mostly retired captains and can supply technical jargon at the drop of a hat. For example, what do you expect the aunty happily knitting and watching the cricket to make of “the ball is now going through the top? ” Many of them lack the vocabulary to describe a word picture of the atmosphere at the ground. The above-mentioned men were easily able to do this.
Add to them the name of the suave, dulcet voice of the experienced Mark Nicholas, arguably the best cricket commentator in the world today.
Alas, gone are the days of the men of the calibre of the mellifluous Charles Fortune, doyen of cricket commentators of the pre television era.
But while the texture of cricket commentary has changed a great deal since Charles Fortune and the likes of Englishmen Brian Johnston and Henry Blofeld, the game has been blessed with people such as Ian Botham, David Gower and David Lloyd. And what about the irascible Geoff Boycott? Some Boycott quotes: on a dropped catch: “My granny could have caught that in her pinny” and on a batsman playing and missing: “She could have hit that with a stick of rhubarb.” And the splendid Lancastrian David “Bumble” Lloyd (remember him?): “And here comes “Oval Ntini (Mayhaya Nitini) with his thunderbolts.” A play on the bed-time drink “Ovaltini” (Made from malted milk. And with the lights on at the Oval in full sun after a rain squall, Ian Botham: “I’d hate to have their light bill.” David Gower: “And they’d hate to have your wine bill.”
Bill Lawry was one who could give Horatio Nelson a run for his money in the one-eyed stakes! Although this great cricketer is now retired, his opinions still rankle. It was always a whiff of fresh air whenever is friend, Greig, put him in his place. I recall one Test match when Australia were at the top of their game and still had the services of Warne and McGrath. Lawry was rabbiting on about the might of the national side when Greig cut him short with a withering reminder that it was he, Lawry who was skipper of the Aussies when whitewashed 4-0 in SA in the 1969-1970 season. That shut him up for a while!
In that series, Carl Coetzee, one of our foremost umpires of the time, had several encounters with this outspoken Aussie. The second Test at Kingsmead in Durban which I was fortunate enough to attend comes to mind.
The incomparable Barry Richards had reached 94 before lunch on the first day and the crowd was willing him on to reach a rare 100 before the break. When the ground clock showed 12.30, the designated time for lunch, Lawry walked forward and flicked the bails off at the bowler’s end. As it happened both Coetzee and his colleague, Gordon Draper an East Cape man and incidentally, an uncle of Gavin Cowley, well known rugby commentator and in his day, a prominent all round sportsman, had discussed the ground clock with the captains before the start. The clock had a history of losing a minute approaching the half hour and making it up on the way up.
For that reason it was decided the umpires’ watches would constitute the official time. So when Coetzee reminded Lawry of this and told him there was a minute to go, he reluctantly replaced the bails.
Bad move for SA, as it turned out because the Aussies immediately claimed the wicket of Springbok skipper Ali Bacher, run out trying to give Richards the opportunity to achieve a memorable milestone before lunch.
And speaking of milestones, what does one make of Wiaan Mulder’s (the stand-in skipper of the Proteas) weird decision to declare with his score on 367 not out in the Test match against Zimbabwe recently when he was so close to Brian Lara’s Test record of 400?
Lara and Chris Gayle among other notable players, both stated it was a once in a lifetime opportunity missed and Mulder most definitely should have gone for it.
Scored against a modestly talented Zimbabwe, Mulder said the feat would have diminished Lara’s legacy.
Anyway, the game will survive but for the time being let’s enjoy the six white-ball internationals now under way against Australia in Australia — and for me to see how the next big thing in SA, Dewald Brevis, fares.
