The image will be a familiar one to a certain generation of South African cricket fans. Nicky Boje, the 12th man, standing on the side of rainy Kingsmead with a sopping wet piece of paper in his hand.
The occasion is the 2003 World Cup. South Africa are hosts. They’ve already lost the Newlands opening game to the West Indies and Kiwi skipper Stephen Fleming has pulverised them at the Wanderers, another defeat. Their campaign is hanging by a thread.
Now Boje is trying to run past umpire Steve Bucknor so he can get a message on. The match has been reduced to 45 overs, and 13 runs are needed by Mark Boucher and Lance Klusener off Sri Lanka’s final over, bowled by Muttiah Muralitharan.
At the end of the over, thanks to some Boucher pyrotechnics, the scores are tied. But Bucknor stymies Boje, so Boucher is unaware that one run needs to be added to the 13. This is Boje’s message. He never gives it. Boucher blocks the seventh ball of “Murali’s” over because he has bowled an earlier wide. A tie is not good enough. South Africa are out of their own World Cup.
Shaun Pollock had pink eye during the 2003 Cricket World Cup, a sign of stress. Not too many got up close to see it. What they saw instead was the image of Pollock in the Kingsmead dressing room as the Sri Lanka match was unfolding. His eyes were big as hubcaps, his chin was in his cupped hands, a portrait of utter dejection.
As if Pollock didn’t have enough on his plate in 2003, he also had to deal with the antics of an uppity 22-year-old, drafted in mid-tournament to replace the injured Jonty Rhodes. His name was Graeme Smith, a belligerent left-hander who was to make an indelible mark on South African cricket for the next 12 years.
Smith has since gone on to a high-profile career as tournament director of the SA20. Just last week he was offered the role of deputy tournament director for the 2027 Cricket World Cup. A source close to Smith called it “a braindead decision”, and it was duly rejected.
On Saturday, the worst-kept secret in local sport was finally let out of the bag when it was announced that Qondisa Ngwenya, formerly president of Cycling South Africa, was to become CEO of the 2027 local organising committee (LOC). Eddie Khoza, formerly of Cricket South Africa, would be COO.
Not only was the decision months late, but the media release announcing it rang hollow. Said LOC chair Trevor Manuel: “They [Ngwenya and Khoza] have proved to be more than capable of delivering the board’s vision to unite the global community through the ICC Cricket World Cup 2027.”
Neither Ngwenya nor Khoza has done the job before, so how could they have already demonstrated an ability to do it?
How is this practically or logically possible? Neither Ngwenya nor Khoza has done the job before, so how could they have already demonstrated an ability to do it? We are in Alice in Wonderland’s world of the Mad Hatter and the Mock Turtle.
Under Manuel’s chairmanship, the LOC has been absent and uncommunicative. The broader cricket community has said for months that an announcement about a CEO was long overdue. The LOC has moved with the speed of a snail on antidepressants.
By this stage in the 2003 World Cup’s life cycle, Ali Bacher was entrenched as tournament director. Media matters were elegantly dealt with by the late Rod Hartman, former sports editor of the Sunday Times. A strategy was in place.
“The LOC’s first operational job [appointing a tournament director] has floundered in politics,” says an insider. “We are underwhelmed. You’re doing work with one hand tied behind your back. This should have happened six months ago. You’ve lost credibility.”
A strategy is manifestly not in place for the 2027 Cricket World Cup, a competition hosted by South Africa with a handful of matches being played in Namibia and Zimbabwe. No-one knows anything about a tournament schedule or ticketing, though it is early days yet.
The South African public knows nothing about the government’s perception of the tournament — or its importance. There are stories to tell, such as the tournament’s reliance on “tray pitches” lowered onto the square, but no-one in officialdom is telling them.
South Africa isn’t hosting international sporting events any more. The last one was the Fifa World Cup in 2010, but that was 16 years ago. Durban has flirted with hosting a Commonwealth Games.
Many believed the 2023 Rugby World Cup should have been awarded to South Africa. It wasn’t, and it went to France. Rian Oberholzer, South African Rugby’s CEO, has said he doubts South Africa will host another Rugby World Cup ever again.
South Africa is no longer in her post-democracy honeymoon. Hosting rights have to be earned with the hard currency of demonstrable ability. Sentiment will no longer do.
In a sense, it is invidious to compare the South Africa of 2003 with the South Africa of 2026. We are now post-Jacob Zuma, post-Covid, post-state capture, post-Marikana, post-Eskom’s meltdown. If not more prosperous, we are more settled, more comfortable in our own clothes and our own skin.
We have shed the idea that we will wake up in the morning and won’t be here. It is no longer five minutes to midnight, though as far as the 2027 Cricket World Cup is concerned, it is clearly well past noon.
The CEOs at South Africa’s major cricket provinces, meanwhile, are rolling up their World Cup sleeves. Jono Leaf-Wright of the Gauteng Lions talks of a possible hotel over the grass embankment on the western side of the Wanderers.
“We’re looking to improve the players’ facilities and give the president’s suite and the hospitality suites a facelift,” he says. “There are commercial parties interested in building the hotel.”
Despite doing what he can, Leaf-Wright has questions. He reasonably expects the Wanderers to host the World Cup final, as it did in 2003, when Australia’s Ricky Ponting scored a masterful century, but he doesn’t know for sure. The uncertainty affects his constituency.
Newlands would get the opening game, but we’d be very disappointed if we didn’t get the final
— Jono Leaf-Wright
“We can accommodate 30,000, give or take. We’re the ground with the biggest capacity in the country,” he says. “We’d expect India vs Pakistan. Newlands would get the opening game, but we’d be very disappointed if we didn’t get the final.”
Other CEOs have been similarly active. Jacques Faul (Titans) and Heinie Strydom (Dolphins) have bedded down their new LED lights, which don’t need the traditional warming up, improve the TV image and use less electricity than the previous lights. They are backed up by in-house stadium generators. Kingsmead has its own water supply.
Leaf-Wright says engagement with the City of Joburg has been positive. “We’re in a good place with the city,” he says. “Support has been good.”
But in Gqeberha, St George’s Park’s ageing Frielinghaus stand roof (where the famous band sits) is full of asbestos. It needs to come down, or World Cup hosting rights will be taken from the city. Buffalo Park in East London has a variety of compliance issues, the FM understands, and will only host daytime matches.
And what of Zimbabwe? At the 2003 World Cup, England didn’t travel to Harare to play Zimbabwe. They initially cited security fears, but their attitude was broadly understood as opposition to Robert Mugabe’s regime.
New Zealand didn’t go to Kenya, another co-host in 2003, citing security issues. Undeterred, the ICC awarded Zimbabwe and Kenya the points from the matches England and New Zealand failed to play. In Kenya’s case, they went through to the semifinals. Might politics rear its head in such a way again? In all likelihood, yes. But in a different form.
In 2003, the Proteas weren’t able to take advantage of their status as hosts. The tournament starting in October 2027 offers a rare opportunity to try again, playing in front of fans who wear watermelon hats and know the meaning of “Mzansi”. This is theoretically an advantage. Whether South Africa will be able to seize it, only time will tell. As Napoleon once said: “In affairs of magnitude, everything invariably turns on a trifle.”
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