[imagesource:wonder]

Watching South Africa play test cricket in my youth was unattainable. It became my holy grail.

Rain doused my hopes of seeing South Africa playing the English Rebels in 1982. I eventually watched them in a test against India in 1992 when the sun shone on our atonement. I have seen as much as possible since the old-fashioned rhythms provide peace and represent a physical incarnation of my naive impression of civilisation.

Cricket’s administrators have tacked. First by creating the Big Three and now, on an aggressive line into a developmental wind, towards an avaricious model, which awards test matches and revenue shares to countries based on the number of eyes watching them.

Cricket South Africa decided in 2021 that it could only survive the existential threat of exclusion from the top tier of test cricket by contracting its best players to play in the SA20 in January when it would normally host test cricket series. Hence, no contracted players are permitted to play in a test series in New Zealand in January 2024.

How will we compete if we only play five tests a year when our best players aren’t allowed to play? Test cricket is already under threat.

Apart from a handful of purists, the best players have jumped aboard the merry-go-round of T20 franchise cricket to optimise their commercial value. The future of the game would be secure if T20 was a suitable replacement for test cricket, but it is not. It is a cacophonous kaleidoscope lacking in meaningful complexity or depth to remain with you for longer than a few hours. It provides us with none of the space humanity craves to right ourselves from our dystopian future. Fickle fans will cast it aside like an unwanted toy when they discover this.

Test cricket is at its best when it is a competition between a variety of diverse teams with authentic national styles. Gambling West Indians against snarling Aussies. Sri Lankan unorthodoxy versus English uniformity. Where test series are allocated the time and resources for these factors to play out in multi-dimensional contests laced with psychology and intrigue.

Why wouldn’t the ICC use T20 revenues to sponsor a sensible amount of test cricket below the top tier? Poor countries who play a handful of tests a year won’t compete with rich ones who play twenty.

Does the BCCI understand that its actions deny young South Africans the joy of being converted to this beautiful game by heroes like Rabada? The same India that was the first colony to be unchained. Weren’t they watching as grown-up spoiled brats in bacon and egg ties cursed the Australian cricket team like petulant prep schoolboys as they clattered through the Long Room at Lords?

Don’t they understand that this is what colonialism does to its masters? Even the much-maligned financial services industry is getting it right. Rivers of money are flowing south to stall climate change and save the natural world. Why not in cricket?