Cricket lovers would never believe that the Test format has spent decades fighting for attention and relevance in the calendar — cricket’s calendar never mind the global sports diary — given the hype being lavished on the World Test Championship final starting at Lord’s on Wednesday.
Dozens of past and current Proteas cricketers have described the match against Australia as the “most important for SA cricket” since the return from isolation and none of the squad, certainly not captain Temba Bavuma, has felt the need to downplay the occasion or its significance.
“For SA to remain competitive and be regarded as a top cricketing nation, we’ve got to be in these positions to go for silverware. To get over the line would be a massive feather in our cap, not just for these players but for Test cricket and for the whole country. So, here’s another opportunity for us to do that,” Bavuma said.
“It would be so special. It’s already a career highlight — there have been moments of resilience, moments of great determination, all of those things, but it would be nice if they were backed up with a trophy. I can fantasise but you don’t always get to write the story.”
Media commitments have consumed many hours of Bavuma’s time requiring him to relive and retell his life story many times — informal cricket on a potholed street in Langa which the children called “Lord’s”. And now, here he is. It must, surely, be a heavy emotional load to carry.
“If you’d asked me that three or four years ago I would have said ‘yes’. Now I try to focus on the cricket as much as I can and try not to get drawn too much into the emotional side of it, though it is important. But we know it’s going to be very tough against a great Australian team and, while we must embrace the venue and the occasion, it is only what we do on the field that matters,” Bavuma said.
Australian captain Pat Cummins may have seen (and won) far more than Bavuma and his team — including the WTC final two years ago — but that didn’t mean he was any less excited by the contest: “It’s a huge event and a very big deal for us against a SA team which has played really good cricket over the last year or so and deserve to be here in the final.
“We’ve probably only played red ball cricket against half of their team before so there are a few unknowns and we’ll have to do a bit more problem-solving on our feet, which is exciting. But we do know how good Kagiso Rabada and Keshav Maharaj are, prolific wicket-takers for a long time, so we’ll have to be on our game. Being the first team to successfully defend this title would be extremely special,” Cummins said.
Cummins and Rabada became friends during the Indian Premier League (IPL) two years ago and the respect is mutual. Bavuma was asked whether the respect of Rabada’s own teammates had been affected by his recent positive test — and one month ban — for the use of cocaine.
“Conversations have been had. He had a conversation with the team and put himself on the spot for further questioning from any of the players and, as far as we know, that’s behind us. We’ve really come here with the focus of what we need to do. KG (Rabada) is in the best shape of his life and is highly motivated. Playing against the Australians is always extra motivation for him. He’s in a very good space,” Bavuma said.
There is, of course, also the considerable matter of money — though it means far more to the majority of the SA squad than their Australian counterparts. The winners of this one-off match will be paid $3.6m which exchanges into a life-changing number of rand even after commissions, tax and a pro-rata division of payments based on appearances during the two-year journey to the final.
Cummins had a more prosaic view: “It’s good for the game and for Test cricket when an event is recognised for it’s importance, whether that’s TV audiences or other forms of income-generation. If the cricket playing world pauses for a few days to watch this game then it’s a big deal,” Bavuma added.
It is, indeed, a big deal. Bigger for SA than Australia, though.
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