When cricketers in dire straits turned to mine-sweeping

Mine-sweeping was a habit indulged in by touring Zimbabwean teams of the late 1990s and early 2000s when the only income they were certain of receiving was the daily allowance paid by the hosts, that came in cash, too, which made it even more valuable.

By the time salaries and match fees were paid, or if they were paid, they’d often been devalued several hundred percent and had become almost worthless. So when players were handed their brown envelopes at the start of the tour containing a crisp $100 note for every day of their stay in Australia or New Zealand – or Pakistan – many of them were perfectly happy to do some mine-sweeping if it meant taking the majority of their meal money back to Harare with them.

South African players have never had to resort to that (not at national level, anyway, although plenty of club and varsity teams will be able to relate to it) but we also have a declining currency and our hosts in the First World do grow tired of hearing us note the high cost of food and drink.

As many of us will have experienced at some point, being booked into a five-star hotel and not being able to afford room service is up there with the unscratchable itch.

There were a few smiles on the faces of the game’s international elite last week when the World XI squad was announced for a three-match, five-day tour to Lahore for the Independence Cup against hosts Pakistan.

There are five South Africans among the 14 players, which led to Englishmen and Antipodeans muttering about our willingness “to do anything for a bit of hard currency”.

Not that the fee is just “a bit”. The five days are worth a staggering $100,000 per man with a “bit” extra for Faf du Plessis as captain.

But I’d like to think there’s far more to it than money, and not just for the South Africans. The man who is coaching the World XI for the three T20 internationals on Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday is Andy Flower who famously protested against the “death of democracy” in his homeland of Zimbabwe by wearing black armbands with Henry Olonga during the 2003 World Cup.

He selected the team himself, making personal phone calls to everyone – more on the basis of their personality and humaneness than their cricketing suitability, although it’s still an extremely handylooking bunch of internationals.

George Bailey and Grant Elliott are two of the most empathetic, articulate and modest sportsmen you could ever meet. Elliott played for the Lahore Qalandars in the Pakistan Super league (staged in the UAE) so he knows how desperate Pakistanis are to have some international cricket back on home soil.

Flower knew what he wanted and where to find it.

When people say this tour is “sending a message”, it is tragically pitiful to suggest that it is the Taliban or other radicals who are the intended recipients. Can anybody really picture terrorist leaders calling off all future suicide bombings because they are futile in the face of the World XI’s arrival?

The message is to the ordinary people of the region, and specifically the families who have suffered so much hardship, suffering and death. Cricket is merely the medium through which Flower and his players and, by extension, all cricket lovers can express a solidarity with the people who have been denied their right to a normal, safe life – never mind international cricket.

The players are surrounded by more security than most heads of state receive.

There will be plenty of real mine-sweeping as part of the security operation but, back in the day, it involved looking beneath the silver domes on room service trays outside hotel rooms in the search for leftover chips, unwanted bread rolls and surplus slices of pizza.

None of that will be happening at the five-star Pearl Continental this week – not by those being paid $20k a day and, hopefully, changing a few lives along the way.