Sunday Times - February 16, 2014
TELFORD VICE, Centurion
The Wanderers swirls with the snarling frustration of those who have to live in one of the world’s least lovely cities. Newlands is a centre of unmitigated, self-deluding snobbery. Kingsmead, soaked in cane-and-coke, is more grimy urban grotto than cricket ground. Centurion is the blonde airhead of grounds - good to look at but not a lot there. St George’s Park? Is it still there?
But the Wanderers is also where visiting teams are left in no doubt that they are taking on an XI and 30 000 of their closest, noisiest, most loyal friends. Newlands in a certain light is what cricket would look, sound, smell and feel like if it was played in paradise. Kingsmead is a beach party, once removed from the ocean. Centurion is a comfortable outdoor lounge arranged around a game of cricket. And St George’s, the best of the lot, is a favourite aunt: quirky, perhaps even a little mad, but friendly and generous and always keen on a good old jol.
It is one of the special privileges - the real kind, not receiving email from Cricket SA - of writing about the game for a living to be able to imbibe the character of all of these places.
Those who do not know this pleasure, who are confined to one venue for most of their cricket-watching lives, should not fret. Give the ground you know your heart and it will give you its soul.
Which is not to say that soul will be worth having. Spectators are not respected nearly as much as they should be at stadiums in SA, where finding parking is drudgery on wheels, food is ordinary at best, a decent cup of coffee is unheard of, as is beer of drinkable quality. Wine? No chance.
Toilets are crowded, disgusting or both, the needs of parents with children are an afterthought, and the entire experience is easily spoiled by the bloke in front of you, the one who has made five too many trips to the bar.
But, before and after they are anything else, cricket grounds are places where things we will remember forever are designed to happen. Happily, they do, and in a way different to the more urgent thrills of watching football and rugby matches.
When a cricket memory is created, the game stops to allow it to take hold properly. The crowd salutes the player and the player salutes the crowd, and for a magical moment admiration and appreciation are all around and the world seems whole.
When a football or rugby memory is created, the best the crowd can hope for is a dumb dance or a primal yawp meant to signify shared aggression in a common cause. And that’s after the players have celebrated their success among themselves.
The character of the place where those cricket memories are made is part of their creation. At Lord’s, applause swells slightly out of sync with realtime events. It’s as if much of the crowd aren’t sure they have seen something to warrant a show of approval. So they hold off and allow the crusty old buggers in the egg-and-bacon ties to lead them in worship, politely of course - no happy-clappers allowed here.
At London’s other test ground, The Oval, reactions are razor-sharp and instinctive, and ties of any stripe are much rarer than across town. That Lord’s is in larney St John’s Wood and The Oval in red-brick Kennington is no accident.
Put a test ground in Soweto and watch cricket in SA leap to relevance, and life.
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