The term `underprivileged cricket clubs' applies to those cricket clubs that have predominantly black players from the historically non-traditional cricket areas due to past colonial imbalances, where cricket was promoted only among the white community.

INCREASE IN CRICKET CLUBS

The pioneer of these underprivileged clubs is Winstonians CC, with its player base mainly in Highfield Township. The past two years have seen the formation of five such new clubs, namely Northwinds, with its player base in Chitungwiza, Mabvuku from the township of the same name, Glen Shire from Glen View, Shamva CC from Shamva, and Chitungwiza CC.

The formation of these clubs is the result of two main factors. Firstly, there is the success of the Zimbabwe Cricket Union's cricket awareness programmes run in the above-mentioned townships, and secondly, the success of the Zimbabwe national team in the international arena, mainly the World Cup. It has raised the profile and understanding of the game among the majority in the townships.

EXPENSIVE SPORT

It is a known fact that cricket is an expensive sport. The price of equipment is prohibitive to many aspiring cricketers; for example, the cost of a good-quality bat is Z$7000, a match ball for every weekend is $750 and a top-quality ball is $1600. The operations budget is the nightmare for all the underprivileged clubs.

It is undesirable and bad for nation-building to have cricket as an elitist sport. At the end of the day, it is the elite who can afford equipment to play. In my opinion it is a paramount duty of the cricket authorities, like the Zimbabwe Cricket Union and the provincial associations, to make sure that no one is excluded from playing cricket because of the money issue.

VISION

It is an open secret that cricket's long-term survival as well as success will be derived from natural competition, which comes from numbers. These numbers are inevitably going to be supplied by the underprivileged clubs. The more people there are who play cricket, the wider the selection options will be for national teams. The stiffer the competition for places, the better the quality for national teams.

ACROSS THE LIMPOPO

The United Cricket Board of South Africa, who not so long ago shook off the apartheid system, recognized clearly the importance of underprivileged clubs and nurture their survival through the catering of operations budgets; i.e., balls, transport, bats, pads and even lunches.

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