The joy of winning: A victory at last is good, but the way it was achieved is better
CRICKET: Jon Swift
A SOLITARY win in a dozen one-day outings in a limited overs international that will be largely unremembered in three seasons’ time, is hardly cause for celebration. But the overall manner in which Hansie Cronje led his side to that stirring 69-run B&H series victory over New Zealand at Newlands earlier this week is truly cause for breaking out the banners.
For while the unbridled pleasure in the playing of the glorious game — in whatever abbreviated, multi-coloured hue — may not always be evident on the stoic Cronje features, that feeling comes soaring through.
At this juncture, it is well to remember that Cronje is very much a tyro captain. He has some things still to learn that only the double-headed serpent of repeated victory and the bitter disappointment of unexpected defeat will fully imprint on his approach to the business of leadership.
But he has managed — doubtless with a nudge from coach Bob Woolmer — to instil some of the sheer joy of cricket back into a side lacking both consistency with the bat and real bite with the ball. It is evident in the adventurous nature of his field placings. Cronje has taken in the many exemplary lessons he learnt in the on-going master class from former skipper Kepler Wessels.
Wessels, it must be said, almost single-handedly provided a springboard for future South African teams. What he did not provide was the acceptance of an element of risk which makes for great victories. This, sadly, was not in the otherwise seamless professionalism of the Wessels make-up.
In the approach of the national selectors too, there is a subtle change. In bringing back Clive Eksteen and harnessing the abilities of Mike Rindel, they have progressed from the closed hands of a garage poker player to the brasher demeanour of a faro dealer.
Cronje, in short, has a different hand of cards than did Wessels.
Eksteen’s reappearance as an international cricketer is overdue. He will still be guilty on occasion of the loose ball while looking for too much off a not overly responsive track, as was the case in Cape Town. Yet there has always been the feeling about his game that here — held on a close rein it must be added — is a potential matchwinner. Left-arm tweakers of merit are to be encouraged, not used with the mindless abandon associated with throwaway cigarette lighters.
It is well that Eksteen — who despite three needless boundaries given away, still managed to concede only four runs apiece off his five overs at Newlands — takes his licks in the one-day game. It can only harden his resolve and temper his technique for the five-day tests. He is not a Shane Warne, but the tall Transvaler is still a valuable commodity and an essential ingredient in breaking the batsmen’s rhythm against an incessant barrage of seam. We look forward to him operating at the other end from an Allan Donald, a Brett Schultz or an Aubrey Martyn.
Rindel too will benefit mightily from being part of the one-day side. As a left-hander, he has a built-in advantage at the crease and his innate attacking spirit lends some fire to the batting order.
Rindel’s ability to get the ball over the ring of fielders may — at this stage — aggravate the tendency to looseness of shotmaking which is currently evident. It is an exciting aspect of the way he plays the game and one Cronje, riding on a long rein, will undoubtedly let flow.
In simply being part of the national set-up though, Rindel must — if only through peer pressure — benefit to the extent that he curbs the wilder side of his cricketing nature. This is another treat to hold expectantly for the future. That he succeeded so well with the ball in his hands — and who can argue with bowling figures of 2/15 and Man of the Match laurels in his debut at this level — is a decided bonus for both Cronje and the team as a whole.
Rindel — as did Cronje, who snapped up the crucial wicket of Martin Crowe — bowled as well at Newlands as any of the frontliners in the attack and, while it may have been a gamble to use him, it was a chance which proved both entertaining and successful in the analysis.
Which, in contrast, leads us back to the recent record of the South African side. This, no matter which way you cut it, has not been a neon-lit path to great memories.
The victory over Ken Rutherford’s fighting band of New Zealanders will be placed more clearly in context by the start of the new week.
On Saturday they face their biggest challenge thus far in the quest to win the Mandela Cup when they meet the formidable Pakistanis at the Wanderers. Here, one feels that any bowling the likes of Cronje or Rindel can produce will be less effective. And immediately across the Jukskei to Pretoria’s Centurion Park for Sunday’s return match against the Kiwis, who will want nothing more than to extract revenge for the humiliation.
These two encounters, on the higher bouncing strips of the Highveld, will produce what amounts to an acid test of Cronje’s resolve to continue playing the game the way he has indicated he would want.