Trevor Chesterfield

There has never been a World Cup entry like it in the 24 years history of the event, and as never is the sort of word serious editors frown on when it slips into view: it is not one to be used lightly. Yet, there we were, at the Sydney Cricket Ground that February afternoon in 1992 when Kepler Wessels put his foot on the near hallowed turf and the rest of the team, dressed in that gaudy green, rushed past him, as if in a 50 metre sprint.

Kepler Wessels... Allan Donald... Jonty Rhodes... Hansie Cronje... Peter Kirsten, Meyrick Pringle... Andrew Hudson... The SCG tannoy blurted out a number of unfamiliar names as Donald and Rhodes and Pringle dashed out to get rid of that pent-up energy, with Donald leading the way with that high-stepping action. It was February 26: payday for many in South Africa; the way the game went it was payback time at the SCG.

South Africa, having peeped into the future at international level after that six-day three-match political exercise four months before in India were back in the arms of the world; at home dawn’s first fingers of light had barely brushed the horizon and many were up early to watch the proceedings. But, as with everything you had to be there to experience the tingle of excitement and grip of emotion.

It was a new dawn, a new era in the last decade of the century. It sort of summed up the aura of the World Cup 24 years after the first tournament was held in England with only six Test nations and a handful of ICC hopefuls: Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe among them and during a month of perfect June weather, gave new emphasis to the limited-overs game.

On that February afternoon in 1992 Wessels was not too unaccustomed to such frenzied scenes. Normally quiet and stoical he took it all as it came. The others, in time, would get used to it. In was a first World Cup for the novices who learnt to mature: a tournament of triumph, trial, tribulation and tragedy. South Africa met the rest of the world and liked what they saw and wanted more: a lot more.

It was the first time the eight Test nations had been together in one tournament and the fledging Zimbabwe as the extra from the courtesy of winning the ICC tournament.

Few have forgotten South Africa’s all too convincing nine wicket victory over the Wizards of Oz (Shane Warne was not then a factor, not even in the squad); some still remember the biting criticisms of defeat Wessels endured when the side lost as comprehensively to New Zealand and lost to the mouse that roared, Sri Lanka, by three wickets with one ball of the innings remaining in a low scoring match.

Many still remember how the flamboyant West Indies style of batting and the late away swing generated by Pringle undid their top-order at Lancaster Park; there is too still a buzz when there is recall of the run out by Jonty Rhodes of Inzamam-ul-Haq at the Gabba in Brisbane; of Mohammed Azharuddin’s cultured fluency at Adelaide Oval in a lost cause for India. A man with superb timing and technical qualities few of today’s greats have, Azhar can still produce the same quality when he bats.

Yet no one can forget that bizarre moment on a drizzling March evening barely a month after the victory over Australia at the SCG. South Africa returned, a semi-final against England, slow over rates meant penalties; light drizzle saw the farce. In South Africa there is a view that there is nothing drier than an Aussie towel. After that night the World Cup rain-affected match conditions kicked South Africa in the teeth. There was bitter disappointment in the dressing room and frustrated anger in the crowd and more so by a patriotic audience at home.

Hopefully the Duckworth/Lewis, already criticised by Wessels and Ken Rutherford, will not throw up such incongruous results this year. In 1975, when the World Cup was first held and a commanding West Indies won the final at Lord’s it was far more simple: there were six Tests countries and a few who wanted to be part of the greater family. Twenty-four years and seven tournaments later it has swelled to nine with hopefuls Kenya and Bangladesh, already sporting LOI status, seeking elevation.

There is certainly a place in the calendar for the event: once every four years and not three, or even two, as has been suggested; too much overkill is bad for the game. It becomes commercially driven and loses its value. Yet, because of its very nature, and format, the limited-overs game lends itself to a certain excitement; gives the public a result, even if it is manufactured by a calculation based on a variety of suppositions and assumptions rather than fact. Fortunately an extra day has been set aside this year to give teams a chance to win fairly and not through a fabricated formula.

This aside, the World Cup, 1999, returns the game to the country of its roots as the birthplace of the game is as shrouded in mystery as are the first laws and implements, where Farmer Brown’s field looked better equipped to stage a game circa 1550 than Old Uncle Tom Cobbleigh’s patch of turf. In those days it was country pastime, played more for fun. The laws framed first in 1722 and the advent of the MCC along with W G Grace changed all that.

Now we have Bangladesh and Scotland taking part for the first time: brave new faces challenging the world for a slice of recognition if not success. Being in England the first few weeks of this last summer of the millennium could be an enjoyable experience for those old hands and new faces. But don’t blink too often: the organisers may object as someone may have already bought the rights to that as well.. !