A woman’s place is in Test cricket
Telford Vice
What’s the sound of one hand clapping? Mignon du Preez isn’t a Zen Buddhist, so she doesn’t use koan riddles to free her consciousness from the constraints of logic. But she has a decent idea of the answer to that question.
Du Preez has scored 13 centuries – including an undefeated 203 – in her 542 senior matches for provinces, franchises and South Africa. As an under-13 she made 258 in a 40-over inter-provincial match, 196 of them in fours and sixes. Even so, the 102 she made against India in Mysore in November 2014 was unlike any of her other successes.
“India declared on 400, so I knew we would need big partnerships and that a couple of our batters would need to score big runs if we wanted a chance at chasing India’s total down,” Du Preez told Cricbuzz. “I think the biggest change for me was probably my mindset. I was a lot more patient at the crease and I wanted to bat time. However, if I could do it over again, I would definitely want to improve my strike rate.”
She batted for a mite more than four-and-a-half hours and faced 253 balls: a not exactly Bairstowesque strike rate of 40.32. That wasn’t why so few pairs of hands applauded Du Preez’ feat – there weren’t many hands at the Gangothri Glades ground in the first place, and no pairs of eyeballs watching from home.
“To score my maiden Test hundred in my debut Test, as captain, was really special; probably the ultimate dream Test experience,” Du Preez said. “Unfortunately at that time there was not big support for women’s cricket, so it was only in front of my teammates without the excitement of hearing the fans roar or even family being able to watch it at home as it was not televised or streamed back then. However, I am really blessed that I had the opportunity to experience the ‘pinnacle format of cricket’, as it’s referred to in the male cricket environment.”
That innings was special, and not just for Du Preez. In all of Test cricket only David Houghton has also scored a century on debut and as captain – 121 against India in Harare in October 1992; Zimbabwe’s inaugural Test. Du Preez might take comfort from the fact that Houghton’s strike rate was 37.57. There are many differences between the two players. One of them is that Houghton played 22 Tests while that match almost eight years ago was Du Preez’ first and last in the format, and her only first-class game.
Du Preez, who retired from Tests and ODIs in April, provided written answers to questions for this piece while she was on holiday in Greece. Good luck getting other male former Test captains or centurions or indeed players to do that. Unless, of course, money is involved. There isn’t a lot of it in the women’s game. What there is has been sunk into white-ball cricket, which has earned a place in the public consciousness not because it deserves to be there – which it does undeniably – but because administrators, broadcasters and sponsors have recognised its potential as a revenue source.
Women’s Test cricket? Not so much, not least because it is rare. The Mysore match was South Africa’s last before the game against England in Taunton, which started on Monday. It is the 144th women’s Test. Some 400 kilometres to the north and also on Monday the other England team beat New Zealand by seven wickets in men’s cricket’s 2,467th Test. The equations are less skewed in the white-ball formats: there have been 4,418 men’s ODIs and 1,280 women’s, and 1,580 men’s T20Is compared to 1,152 women’s. Men have played 94.48% of all Tests – partly because they had a head start of more than 57 years on women – and 77.54% of all ODIs, but only, relatively, 55.24% of T20Is. “Unfortunately I think it’s easier to market the shorter format of the game as it’s a lot more exciting and appealing to the fans,” Du Preez said.
No, I don’t think we need to accept that (Test cricket purely a man’s game), insists Mignon du Preez
No, I don’t think we need to accept that (Test cricket purely a man’s game), insists Mignon du Preez ©Getty
Did that mean she thought Test cricket wasn’t all it’s routinely cracked up to be? You have read and heard, many times, something similar to Du Preez’ reply: “Look, Test cricket is not called Test cricket for no reason. You will get tested in all aspects of the game. However, I think we will have more appreciation for Test cricket the more we have an opportunity to play it.” Or at least be given the chance to play two-innings cricket more often. Currently, that doesn’t happen at all for women in South Africa. “Yes, I think it will help if they get an opportunity to play the longer format on a regular basis.”
The alternative would be to consider Test cricket purely a man’s game. “No, I don’t think we need to accept that,” Du Preez said. “Just like ODI and T20 cricket for women, women’s Test cricket needs to be appreciated in its own right and not compared to the men’s game.”
There’s a hint of swing there, a gentle admonition of the mentality that sees, before it sees anything else, that boundaries are shorter for a women’s game, that despite that they are not often cleared, and that no female bowlers are fast, even if that is how they are described. Many who can’t stop themselves from thinking those thoughts didn’t think, when they changed the channel from the Taunton Test to see how Emma Raducanu was getting on in her first-round match against Alison Van Uytvanck at Wimbledon on Monday, that they would be short-changed because they wouldn’t be able to watch more than three sets.
The deeper, darker question is whether people of a certain age and outlook extoll the virtues of Test cricket so much and so overtly because, unlike ODIs and T20Is and like an old-fashioned gentleman’s club, it doesn’t often involve women. That view is enabled by the fact that only Test cricket played by women is denoted as such. If it’s labelled “Test cricket” it isn’t explained that it’s men who are playing. It doesn’t need to be because, as we all know, or should know, that’s the norm.
And yet it’s the format, not the gender of those playing, that determines the level of complexity, drama and nuance on display. It’s simply Test cricket because, simply, it’s Test cricket, not because men are playing it. So if we disclaim some matches as “women’s Tests” we should do the same for “men’s Tests”. Or, better yet, remove the apologetic gender specific simper that says, in effect, “We’re calling this Test cricket, but …”
Marizanne Kapp’s 150 at Taunton on Monday, the highest score by a No. 6 in a women’s Test and the highest by any South African woman, is no less an accomplishment because it wasn’t achieved by a man. Indeed, that she was able to perform as she did even though women play so few Tests is a powerful argument to the contrary. Strike rate? A healthy 70.42.
Happily, there were thousands of pairs of hands in attendance to give voice to those truths. But in the silence that followed the applause there was time and space for a more sobering thought: how many fine innings might we have seen from Kapp and Du Preez had South Africa been deemed worthy of playing more than two Tests in almost eight years?
