Perhaps it’s a disease peculiar to a society in which millions try to pretend the past did not exist and millions more remain stuck in that past, but it’s as if the test series never happened.
Sunday Times
TELFORD VICE in Cape Town
WHAT were you doing for the 526.3 overs it took Sri Lanka to beat South Africa, twice, in last month’s test series?
Wondering how things could go so wrong for the No. 2-ranked team in the game, especially as they were playing the No. 6-ranked team?
Trying to blame it all on conditions that, while unmistakably Asian were a long way from tilted too far in the Lankans’ favour?
Refusing to watch, not least because getting up at sparrow in winter only to see your side get smacked, again, is a waste of a good morning’s sleep?
All of the above?
And what have you been doing for the past 15 days while South Africa have been handing the home side a masterclass in how to win one-day internationals, a lesson so convincing that the result of the last two matches of the series were of no consequence?
Being grateful for the generosity of the Sri Lankans, who in an effort to acclimatise to other kinds of surfaces than those common to the sub-continent prepared pitches that behaved far more like those in South Africa?
Marvelling at the reinvention of JP Duminy from the unsure player he was when he announced his retirement from tests in England last year into a master-blasting matchwinner?
Trying to understand how the injection of positivity delivered by the players who were not part of the test series could have such a dramatic effect on a side that had looked down and out?
None of the above?
Perhaps it’s a disease peculiar to a society in which millions try to pretend the past did not exist and millions more remain stuck in that past, but it’s as if the test series never happened.
Pop a point about the Proteas into your pub prattle and pints will be raised in praise.
Notice how many people are talking about how well “we” are playing compared to how many were alarmed about how poorly “they” were playing last month.
Even kneejerk naysaying reporters — this one included — have made but passing references to the troubling tests and are noticeably more enthusiastic about writing up South Africa’s success in the ODIs.
And that despite the longstanding truth that there is significantly more grist for the journalist’s mill when the players they write about are getting it wrong. Losing requires opinion and analysis. Winning needs little more than praise. Guess which is more fun for those blessed with inky veins?
Maybe the opposite is true for people who don’t watch, and report on, cricket for a living. Who, after all, wants to spend their leisure time agonising about why a team are performing below themselves? And who doesn’t want to talk about a bunch of winners until last rounds are called?
Blame the human condition, then, for the fickleness of cricket supporters. What’s a fan to do when “Hash” seems so out of touch with his own greatness he could be mistaken for one of those noisy, fake-bearded imposters at Newlands, Aiden looks like he couldn’t drive a bakkie into a dead cow, much less a ball through the covers, and Dale is about as threatening as decaf.
Sport psychologists talk about “birging” — “basking in reflected glory” — and “corfing — “cutting off reflected failure” — to explain why fans are the way they are, and there’s sense in that.
But it would do all of us good, and deepen our knowledge and appreciation for the game that, for better or worse, clutches us to its bosom no matter what, to look at things with cold eyes.
Not least because our hearts will always be hot for heroes, our minds always looking for reasons to believe victory is not at all impossible, and our souls always smitten with the magic of what happens when ball meets bat.
All together now: “I don’t like cricket …”
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