#ZCBOARD MUST GO

[Googly]

I recall one of the big bosses of Old Mutual get both his kids through a private school here and never paid one single cent from grade 1 to upper 6. No joke.
He played an ugly political race card and the board decided to give him a free pass. It was a while ago, schools have gotten tougher and wiser.

[Googly]

What's your gut feeling on what happens next Googly?

Does DEB have a hope in hell of turning this around or are these the death throes of cricket in Zimbabwe?

I don’t think there’s anything to lose by going down this route. We’re doomed if we continue down the same path.
It all rests on Mlotshwa, he’s a powerful guy and we eventually have the capacity to wrest control from these evil and avaricious people and I think that will happen.
If we still are on the same footing with ICC after this remains to be seen, but as I said I don’t think it matters, we’re dead anyway with these muppets in charge.

In a way it may give us a bit more breathing space because our woeful performances can be blamed on ZC. The acid test is what the new board can do to turn things around, but I believe in a way this upheaval buys us time that we may not have had.
No one is turning this around overnight. It’s a long process. We can complain about our national side all we like but they’re basically the best we’ve got, forget giving other guys him franchise a chance. Sure they may be better on a given day, but that’s cricket.
We need to give ourselves 4 years to make a noticeable improvement.

[Zimco]

How many white people do you think are really still in Zim. I doubt 20000?

Also I think cricket doesn’t have the generational support with Black people in Zimbabwe as it does in Zimbabwe. How many black 50 year olds really care about cricket. They would rather their kids become football stars I am sure (which is understandable).

[Googly]

We need a serious A team coach that has the backing of this new board. Whoever this guy is he has to realize that there’s no guys here capable of setting it alight. If there was they would have made big runs in franchise and they’d be in our national side and doing well. I’ve seen them all, they’re ok, good even, but they’re going to struggle at the highest level. Unless they can get some key guys back here then they have to focus on u19 and downwards and that’s the long haul and I don’t believe we have the time. The best u19 bat is Myers, we’re waiting 5 years before he’s established, you get these guys in too soon and you can mess them up. He’s one guy, we need a handful to choose from. Our franchise cricket is club standard. Our club cricket is village cricket. They need a team that bypasses this and that’s going to cost a lot of money and it needs a serious coaching staff. If they’re serious that’s what they will do.
These guys that can make an almost immediate impact are not begging to come back and play 8 games a year of substandard franchise cricket for the good of country, that bird has flown.

[Googly]

How many white people do you think are really still in Zim. I doubt 20000?

Also I think cricket doesn’t have the generational support with Black people in Zimbabwe as it does in Zimbabwe. How many black 50 year olds really care about cricket. They would rather their kids become football stars I am sure (which is understandable).

No one really cares about cricket anymore, cricket is a family game and most have left. We’re all in survival mode and very few school kids think of cricket as an option anymore. When I say very few I’m talking like 5 and maybe 3 have a shot, it’s bad I tell you. That whole cricket culture thing takes generations to build and it’s been completely destroyed here. We have to be inventive to get it kick started again.
Of course there are black folk that now have the bug. There’s probably more black guys than white now. The damage they’ve done to the “white” cricket is not retrievable, they’re no longer the source of the bulk of the good cricketers so in a way the wishes of certain people have come to fruition, but at the expense of a massive drop in standards. It’s no longer black and white, it’s Zim cricket. Ellman Brown is being handed an almost dead donkey I’m not actually laughing, I’m bitter, it didn’t need to be like this, but we must play the hand that has been dealt.
I’ll give you the numbers again-
Maybe 200 white kids play cricket at high school in Zimbabwe now, maybe the same number at junior school. Of these maybe 30 are not embarrassingly bad and maybe 7 or 8 you could do something with, that’s all age groups from 8 to 18.
Amongst the black community it’s probably treble that, but I stand to be corrected here, someone will hotly deny that and mention fictitious figures because Gokwe play rounders with a hardened goat’s ball.
But at private schools there are way less black players than white, they’re just not interested. So those white figures I mentioned are whites at private schools, so the black kids will be one third of that at the places with real facilities.
But there are some good players amongst this pitiful handful that have a lot of potential.
Amongst our high school boys we have about 6 genuinely good batting prospects. It’s not a lot but if you consider how few kids are actually playing and fewer still that make any effort then this is an unbelievable number. I’m not joking, it really is.

[Googly]

I was just reading Gibbs tweet lamenting proteas u19 being beaten 7-0 by Pakistan. First comment was “what’s your point, this is where Rabada comes from”.
Sums it all up. They’ve gone down the same path. Thieving boards and quota systems that scare away people forever. Not temporarily, but forever!! Shit can break you know, and when the builders have gone there’s no one with capacity to fix it, but it doesn’t matter.

On that note our u19 boys have been training hard and playing lots of local games with mixed results, but where are the tours? ICC allocate money for u19. I’d love to know how much and how much we’ve got left of that. I heard there’s a tour to India?
The WC is in SA in February yet somehow we think a tour to the sub continent will help? That money could be used for 5 tours to SA where the WC will actually be played.
It boggles my fucking head.

[jimmylesaint]

I doubt 20000?

Too many?
in 2012 there was apparently 28k white people 7yrs on probably less than 20k.
The mind set is because whites are a minority then they should be represented by their minority i.e have 1-3whites only in the cricket team which is too much for some.
Its akin to and just as racist if say America forced 7/8 of their final 100m sprinters to be white.
It boils down to opportunistic greed and money as googly says.
For too long too few have said too little against the bad decisions, management and corruption so now it is even evilier

i agree with Googly the current course we were on was eternal damnation from the cricket world....this could change that.
We all have a part to play in the winds of change-there is a new interim board there is a plan there is hope.
There is hope for the first time.We have stopped being victims of our own fears that Cricket wold be suspended and the losers will be us as the Board care not at all for the game.

This is the crossroads.

[Zimco]

Thanks for that Googly and JimmyleSaint.

I think it would be less than 20000 now.

Yes quotas are an evil system. The main problem I see is that they are still not many good black batsmen in South Africa or Zimbabwe. Perhaps Hamilton and Bavuma but I would not call them great. Compare this too West Indies where cricket is multi generational where we have had Lara, Richards, Gayle and the current crop.

It is much harder financially and time wise to produce a batsmen than a bowler. There needs to be facilities in all areas like there is in Australia. Eg free public nets. I did not see many in Zim. Relying on Churchill and PE as the sole churners of Black talent is too small a wheel and too removed from the general population.

[Zimco]

I will disagree with you on one thing. I think tours to India are a good thing. Zimbabwe tour South Africa throughout the u13,14, 15 and 17 formats regularly. Tours to India can also be relatively cheap compared to say going to Uk and we should be trying to get more boys playing in India and Bangladesh. We likely have quite a good relationship with Bangladesh.

[Zimco]

Although considering they had no money to send women to Ireland perhaps the timing of sending a team to India is wrong but in general it is a good idea I think