Test and first-class cricket were both introduced retrospectively to South Africa in the 1888–89 season by the elevation in status of two matches played by an English touring team against a South African national team. At the same time, the Currie Cup was donated by Sir Donald Currie for the domestic championship and this was first contested in the 1889–90 season. Playing standards rose and a number of provincial teams were able to challenge for the championship, including Eastern Province, Griqualand West, Natal, Transvaal and Western Province. South Africa became increasingly involved in international cricket and the national team undertook six overseas tours (five to England and one to Australia) before 1914. Eight teams, seven English and one Australian, toured South Africa during the period.
Beginnings
European colonisation of southern Africa began on Tuesday, 6 April 1652 when the Dutch East India Company established a settlement called the Cape Colony on Table Bay, near present-day Cape Town. Cape Colony slowly expanded along the coast and into the hinterland throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. It was founded as a victualling station for the Dutch East Indies trade route but soon acquired an importance of its own due to its good farmland and mineral wealth.
There was no significant British interest in South Africa until the colony was seized by British forces in 1795 under General Sir James Craig during the French Revolutionary War, the Netherlands having fallen to France in the same year. British policy was to secure the colony against French encroachment in the name of the Dutch StadtholderWillem V. Under the terms of the short-lived Treaty of Amiens in 1803, Cape Colony was handed back to the Netherlands, then known as the Batavian Republic. In 1806, with the Napoleonic Wars proper now under way, British forces again invaded and seized Cape Colony, this time with permanent designs on it. The whole territory was formally ceded to Great Britain in 1814 by the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 and administered as Cape Colony until it joined the Union of South Africa in 1910.
It is believed that cricket was introduced to South Africa by Craig's occupying force.[2] A similar scenario had arisen throughout the British Empire. English soldiers and sailors were the pioneers of the game in numerous foreign lands.[2] One of Craig's officers was Charles Anguish (sometimes known as Charles Clarke) who had been a member of the White Conduit Club and was an early member of Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC). Anguish had played in 32 first-class matches between 1788 and 1795 when he departed for the Cape. He died there, by committing suicide, in May 1797.[3]
It is generally supposed that Anguish organised matches in the colony but the earliest definite reference to cricket there is dated 1808, two years after the re-occupation.[3] A newspaper called The Cape Town Gazzette and African Advertiser carried notice that:[2]
A grand match at cricket will be played for 1,000 dollars a side on Tuesday, January 5, 1808 between the officers of the artillery mess, having Colonel Austen of the 60th Regiment, and the officers of the Colony, with General Clavering. The wickets are to be pitched at 10 o'clock.
The venue for the 1808 match is unknown but there was another military match at Green Point in 1810 between the Ordnance and the 87th Regiment. There is a Green Point club, formed in the 1890s, but it is not certain if it is based at the same venue. If so, then it is the oldest known venue in South Africa.[3]
Early developments
Long before apartheid, cricket was considered "a white man's pastime" in South Africa but there is evidence of it being played by Bantus and Hottentots in 1854. Nevertheless, the surviving records are essentially about games played by whites only.[3]H. Rider Haggard suggested that it became "an obsession" in the white military community and complained about officers insisting on taking cricket gear with them on the ill-fated Isandlwana mission in 1879.[4]
By the middle of the 19th century, cricket had become well-established in Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Pietermaritzburg. The first club known to have been formally constituted was in 1843 at Port Elizabeth, which then had a population of 3,000. The club was allocated some land just outside the town which it still uses as St George's Park.[2] A club was founded in Cape Town in 1844 and in Pietermaritzburg by 1848. The military continued to be cricket's pioneer and staged a match at Bloemfontein, then only a small village, in 1850. There was a match in 1852 between clubs from Pietermaritzburg and Durban.[2]
Cape Colony schools had adopted the game by the 1850s. Its growth in the hinterland was gradual and depended on settlers moving north from the Cape. A match was recorded in the Transvaal in 1861. In 1862, an annual fixture called "Mother Country v Colonial Born" was staged for the first time in Cape Town and became the most important match of the Cape season for many years.[2] The game's popularity in Cape Town led to the foundation of Western Province Cricket Club in October 1864. In 1876, Port Elizabeth presented the "Champion Bat" for competition between South African towns; initially Cape Town, Grahamstown, Kingwilliamstown and Port Elizabeth itself.[2] This competition was played sporadically until 1890 when, with provincial teams now involved, it was superseded by the Currie Cup.[4]
Two major venues opened in 1888: Newlands in Cape Town and the Old Wanderers in Johannesburg.[2] At the end of the year, an English team arrived for the first overseas tour of South Africa. Known at the time as R. G. Warton's XI after its manager, the team played odds matches against several provincial and town teams. Then, in March 1889, it played two eleven-a-side matches against a South African XI. The first was at St George's Park, the second at Newlands. Warton's XI, captained by the future Hollywood actor C. Aubrey Smith, won both games comfortably; at Cape Town, Lancashire spinner Johnny Briggs had match figures of 15 for 28.[5]
Retrospectively, these two matches were assigned first-class status, although the South African team was very weak and Warton's XI included some players who never otherwise played any first-class cricket. Then, after the concept of Test cricket had been established in the 1890s, it was officially decided in 1897 that the matches should be called South AfricaversusEngland and so allocated Test status too.[6] First-class cricket was itself officially defined by MCC and the leading English counties in December 1894. The first match at Port Elizabeth is, therefore, both the inaugural Test played by South Africa and the inaugural first-class match played in South Africa.[6]
The tour was successful, although it did not achieve a financial profit, in that it introduced South Africa to international cricket and provided the domestic game with a huge stimulus. This was underwritten by tour sponsor Sir Donald Currie, founder of the Castle Shipping Line, who donated a trophy for the domestic champions. This was the Currie Cup, first awarded in 1889 to Kimberley.[5]
Start of domestic cricket (1889 to 1891)
Domestic first-class cricket began in December 1889 when Port Elizabeth Cricket Club hosted Natal at St George's Park, the visitors winning a low-scoring match by two wickets.[7] Natal featured in all of the first five matches, which were played between 27 December and 9 January. Their team, on tour, went from Port Elizabeth to Kimberley where they played two matches against Kimberley at the Eclectics ground in Kimberley, the home team winning both. Natal then played two matches at Newlands against Western Province (won by one wicket) and Cape Town Clubs (lost by three wickets).[8]
The Currie Cup was first contested at the end of the 1889–90 season when, as in boxing, a challenge was made to the holders. Transvaal challenged Kimberley and the match began on Saturday, 5 April at the Eclectics ground in Kimberley. Transvaal's captainC. Aubrey Smith and wicket-keeperMonty Bowden had played for Warton's XI the previous year (Bowden had emigrated to South Africa) and their experience gave Transvaal a distinct advantage, enabling them to win by six wickets.[9]
Four first-class matches were played in the 1890–91 season. The first three were a round-robin between Eastern Province, Western Province and Griqualand West in the Champion Bat Tournament. Western Province were the winners after defeating both their rivals.[10] It was the last Champion Bat Tournament as it was superseded by the Currie Cup thereafter. The fourth match was for the Currie Cup, still on a challenge footing. Former holders Kimberley challenged Transvaal and the match was played in April 1891 at the Old Wanderers in Johannesburg. It was into its seventh day before Kimberley won by 58 runs to reclaim the trophy.[11] This was the last Currie Cup challenge match as the competition went national when next contested in the 1892–93 season.
1891 to 1902
No domestic matches took place in 1891–92, when England was on tour. In 1892–93, Western Province won the Currie Cup after defeating both their rivals Transvaal by 91 runs and Griqualand West by 109 runs. In the other match, Transvaal beat Griqualand West by 8 wickets.
From then on, although it was not contested every season, the Currie Cup was the established national championship.
First-class cricket in South Africa was suspended during the Boer War from 1899 to 1902
1903 to 1918
In 1903–04 the Currie Cup had a change in format from a qualifying round-robin followed by a final, for which the holders had already qualified, to a knock-out competition. This allowed for the competition to be held in more than one province. In 1904–05, the competition was expanded to allow for the inclusion of Rhodesia.
First-class cricket was suspended during the First World War from 1914 to 1919. Competition began again in the 1919–20 season.
South Africa won the toss and batted first. They were soon all out for 97, with John Ferris taking 6 for 54. In reply 134 from Henry Wood saw Walter Read's side total 369, a lead of 272 that South Africa were never likely to catch. Ferris's 7 for 37 helped dismiss the South Africans for 83 in their second innings.
The game is more interesting for some historical oddities:
Billy Murdoch and Ferris, who had both previously played for Australia, played for England due to residence.
Frank Hearne, who played for South Africa in this game, had previously played for England. Finally, the game gives the second instance of three brothers playing in the same Test match, as Frank Hearne's brothers, Alec Hearne and George Hearne played for England. A cousin, John Thomas Hearne also played for the tourists.
This tour included The Reef v MCC at Boksburg. It was scheduled as a four-day match but play only took place on two because of bad weather. Although the two teams consisted of recognised players, the South African Board of Control decided as late as 1930 that it had not been a first-class match. Wisden 1931 reproduced a letter from the SABC which outlined its case. Wisden has ignored the ruling and includes the match in the career figures of all the players who took part, including record-breaking players such as Wilfred Rhodes, Jack Hobbs and Frank Woolley.
It is possible that the SABC thought it was a 2-day match, but Wisden 1911 clearly states that "not a ball could be bowled on the first and fourth days" so it was actually planned as a 4-day match. For more information about this curious affair, see Variations in published cricket statistics.
Xenophon Constantine Balaskas, sometimes known as Xen or Bally, was a South African all-round cricketer who scored 2,696 first-class runs at 28.68 and took 276 wickets at 24.11 with his leg-spin bowling.
This article describes the history of South African cricket from the aftermath of the First World War in 1919 to the end of the Second World War in 1945.
Edgar John Barlow was a South African cricketer. Barlow was born in Pretoria, Transvaal, South Africa, and played first-class cricket for Transvaal and Eastern Province from 1959–60 to 1967–68 before moving to Western Province for the seasons from 1968–69 to 1980–81. During this time he also played three seasons with Derbyshire in the English County Championship from 1976 – 1978. He completed his first-class career in Boland in 1982–83. Barlow was named as one of the six South African Cricket Annual players of the year in 1962.
Augustus Bernard Tancred was a leading 19th century South African Test cricketer. His brothers, Vincent and Louis, also played Test cricket for South Africa.
Arthur William Seccull was a cricketer who played one Test match for South Africa in 1896.
Charles Edward Finlason played a single match of Test cricket for the South African national side, against England in March 1889.
Albert Rose-Innes, was a South African cricketer who played in South Africa's first two Test matches.
Clarence Skelton Wimble was a South African cricketer who played one Test match in 1892.
George Alexander Rowe was a South African cricketer.
Robert Graham was a South African Test cricketer who played two Tests in the 1898-99 season.
The England cricket team toured South Africa from 8 November 1938 to 14 March 1939, playing five Test matches against the South Africa national team and 13 tour matches against various provincial sides. England won the third Test by an innings and 13 runs, but the other four Tests finished as draws, including the final timeless Test, which was played over the course of 10 days. The final Test was declared a draw as the England team had to leave to ensure they caught the boat home from Cape Town.
This article describes the history of South African cricket from the end of the Second World War in 1945 to the start of South Africa's cricket isolation in 1970.
South Africa resumed official international cricket in 1991 after the moratorium imposed by the International Cricket Conference in 1970 was lifted. This was the first edition of the sir Vivian Richards trophy. This had restricted official contact with South Africa as a response to the policy of apartheid and South Africa's refusal to select non-white players for their international sporting teams. It formed part of the wider sporting boycott of South Africa during the apartheid era. The South African national team made a short tour of India in 1991. It then played in the 1992 Cricket World Cup in Australia and New Zealand. The decade saw a number of tours of South Africa by major international teams as well as the continued playing of domestic competitions.
This article describes the history of South African cricket from the 2000–01 season. Noted South African players in the 21st century have included Jacques Kallis, Shaun Pollock, Makhaya Ntini, Mark Boucher, Graeme Smith and Herschelle Gibbs.
John Arnold Einem Hickson was an English first-class cricketer and who umpired one Test match in South Africa in 1889.
The 1889–90 Currie Cup was the inaugural edition of the Currie Cup, the premier first-class cricket tournament in South Africa. The 1889–90 competition involved just two teams, Transvaal and Kimberley. The two sides played a single, three-day match, which was won by Transvaal by six wickets.
S. B. Joel's XI cricket team in South Africa in 1924–25 was a team of English cricketers which toured South Africa between November 1924 and February 1925 and played 14 first-class cricket matches and seven other games. The tour was an unofficial one: an official tour of Australia organised by the Marylebone Cricket Club took place at the same time.
Alfred Edward Cooper was a South African cricketer who played at first-class level for Griqualand West and Transvaal.
Harry Ernest Smith was a cricketer who played first-class cricket in South Africa from 1905 to 1908. He toured England with the South Africans in 1907 but did not play Test cricket.
The Cape Province cricket team and its predecessor the Cape Colony cricket team were South African cricket teams that played 11 matches against English touring teams between 1888 and 1948. The last five of these matches had first-class status.
Note: during the isolation of South Africa from international cricket between 1970 and 1991, there were seven unofficial tours (italicised below) by various teams, collectively known as the South African rebel tours.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
