Though the coaching clinic in Kwa-Thema was scheduled to start at 10:30 on January 15 Sunday morning, the time was at the 11th hour postponed to 14:00 and Australia arrived at the pitch at 15:30.
The coaching clinic by Cricket South Africa (CSA) was at the Kwa-Thema Sports Complex at the Prince Thethe Oval.
This was in line with the first U19 Women’s Cricket World Cup hosted by South Africa.
Kwa-Thema Cricket Club (KCC) chairperson Thabiso Msipha said, “We are privileged to get a visit from the teams.
This is an important day for the club and the entire community. This will give our club exposure from other countries such as Australia.”
Speaking about Saturday’s game where South Africa lost by seven wickets to India, Msipha said cricket is a funny game and with the form in which South Africa played anything could happen.
“South Africa put up a good score but India was better,” he said.
Msipha also expressed his disappointment at the leadership of the ward and also the organisers of the event.
“The turn-out from the leadership is poor; we can’t have teams arriving before them.
“The organisers also changed the time to 14:00 giving us no chance to inform people of the time change. People have been here since 10:00 while others had already left,” Msipha said.
Msipha concluded, “The children are happy and we would also like to spread a message to the parents to send their children to the club to join us, cricket can keep children busy and they can produce good results as they may one day see themselves playing for a national team.
“KCC may one day produce a national player, we are that capable.”
KCC Club and Premier League captain Ernest Mbalane said, “It’s amazing to host Australia. We are hoping to learn from them and hope they will also learn from us.”
Mbalane said their premier league games will start on Saturday and they are hoping to win at least seven games so that they may be able to keep their premier status.
“As a club, we believe in winning,” he concluded.
“The two teams (Australia and South Africa) are interested in development, which is a good thing not just for KCC but the community as well,” said KCC former player, Kabelo Setshedi.
The field was not in a good condition and the grass didn’t seem to have been mowed.
“Though this is our facility as Ward 77, an independent body runs things on this field. I understand that the body has a budget, which can assist in maintaining the field. If they have an issue with their budget then they can come to us which they did, however, the municipality has no budget.
“We have received a grant from the province which will be used to renovate the whole complex and the project is due to start next month.
“There is a federation with representatives from all sporting codes. The KCC will have to talk to the federation about what is needed,” said Ward 77 Clr Thulani Dunjane.
When speaking on why the teams arrived late to the oval, senior cricket manager and Legacy lead for the U19 World Cup Johan Weyels said, “There was a mix-up with the communication team. From 09:30 to 12:30 it’s practice time for teams and only after that, we can go to the coaching clinics.”
On the loss SA faced at the hands of India, Weyels said: “It was good entertainment for the crowd. We batted well but at the end of the day, we didn’t execute with the ball what we were supposed to do.
“The programme we staged is part of the global outreach programmes of the International Cricket Council and the coaching clinic is one pillar of the programme.
“We are also working with the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund, with a session held on life skills. The second part of the session is more cricket orientated where the international players are involved with the coaching,” concluded Weyels.
Among those who attended the programme was Prince Thethe after whom the oval was named.
Meanwhile, the U19 women’s teams from Scotland and USA visited the Duduza Cricket Hub last Thursday.
This was also part of their warm-up fixtures towards the world cup which started on Saturday at Willowmoore Park in Benoni.
Duduza Cricket Club coach Tshepo Mofokeng said, “It was an honour to host the teams and we learnt a lot.
“The coaching clinic boosted our girls’ confidence and now they can prepare themselves for the future, hoping that they will play in other countries as well as representing South Africa.”
The coaching clinic was aimed at helping 50 children, however, close to 100 attended.
“We are now looking forward to watching the world cup live at Willowmoore Park and we will be taking 120 children there, most of them being girls,” concluded Mofokeng.
