South Africa finds the sun

Before this day, they were a cricket nation brought together by failure. Now, a lifetime of heartbreak has been banished.

You can hear the sorrow in the laugh; it has a hollow sound. He’s trying to put on a brave face, but when his friend says “I hope they don’t fuck it up,” he knows that there is a chance it might happen, again. ‘Again’ being the crucial undertone. These are two South African fans, but they are all of them.

At stumps on day three, South African cricket was a party, fans chanting around Lord’s for ages, then on the streets of North London. The chanting even made its way into St John’s Wood tube and rebounded off the walls, while normally oblivious London commuters tried to hide on the platform.

Before play on day four, that had all gone. A country had slept poorly. The collective shared an anxious fever dream, which was evident on the faces of every fan. Last night was a celebration; this morning was like watching people at a rocket launch waiting for the countdown. They had done most of the work and were in the right place, but they also knew that none of that mattered. Sometimes, rockets explode.

And if you are a South African cricket fan, your team doesn’t explode, it implodes. A sudden failure that leads to a violent collapse inwards, until there is nothing left but national, generational, all-encompassing heartbreak.

They were called the Proteas after a Western Cape flower, but they were all aware that they had never bloomed.

Aiden Markram is so tall at the crease that he looks like someone created him in a lab. The stumps look tiny behind him. He looks like a proper Dutchman, as the locals would say. Raised on beef with chicken as his salad. When he’s going, he bats like an elephant running through a campsite. It feels like nothing can stop him.

Australia have the new ball, not just anyone, but Josh Hazlewood, or as he’s now known, Hazlegod. If not the best new ball bowler in the world, he’s near enough not to quibble. No one has been able to stay in against him for the last couple of years. But Markram doesn’t seem to notice who has the ball, just that he wants to whack it. So Australia’s last crack at this match is coming at him with the first delivery of the second new ball, and Markram smashes it away wide of mid-on.

There is no fear or doubt. There is only a boundary. If South Africa were going to lose, it was this ball that would start that. Instead, Markram ends it.

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If you’re from another cricket culture, you don’t know what it is like to be South African. They are a one of one. Australia wins, Zimbabwe loses, everyone else is in between. But what is it like to only be known for losing when it matters, while being a team that generally wins? Not for a short time like what India just managed, but as part of your national identity.

On top of that their football team is loved, despite never even getting close to winning a World Cup. And their rugby team won for Nelson Mandela in a way so powerful, Hollywood came calling.

If movies were made of South African cricket, it would be on the Hansie Cronje or Bob Woolmer tragedies. Or a screwball comedy on all the times they found a Mel Brooks way of losing a World Trophy.

Even the things they have won are pretty funny: a Commonwealth Gold medal wearing whites in Malaysia. The ICC Knockout win in what is now the Champions Trophy almost feels like it doesn’t count. And of all the great SA teams that failed, that was one of the more random XIs to win. Mike Rindell says hi. Neither were world titles, just random lesser events. Amuse-bouche trophies.

So South African cricket lives in this collective haunting of their own creation. There are reasons why they have lost that come back to the method of their cricket. But that is not the narrative South Africans live with. Theirs is the pain that there is something inherently wrong with them in cricket. A moral failing, a courage and temperament deficiency. They are the only culture in the world where they have an entirely different c word they avoid.

It follows them around like a red dot from a sniper. Ready to put them down at any stage. A Hardik Pandya wide one, their own players van der Merwe and Elliot, rain, run outs and ties. It is always there. Part of the inherited DNA of South African cricket fans. They grow up knowing the melancholy, passed from aunts and grandfathers, of moments lost when embarrassment rained down on them.

And there were plenty of catastrophic trip hazards in this game. Temba’s drop, Aiden’s edge, explosions off the wicket for Nathan Lyon, top edges that didn’t carry, shies at the stumps, bats in the wrong hand when backing up, balls almost kissing gloves, moisture in the wicket overnight and shooters going low. There are days when South Africa would be destroyed by any one of these. There are times when it would be all of them.

South Africa’s bowlers have carried this team to the WTC final. Kagiso Rabada takes wickets quicker than anyone else in Test history. In this game, he got nine.

Day 3 started with them well in the game, but by lunch Australia were hot favourites. Because South Africa’s bowlers could not dismiss Mitchell Starc or Josh Hazlewood. It was a sign the wicket had changed, that it was easier to bat on. But as Australia got closer to setting a 300 chase, it was hard to rationalise what was happening. South Africa had bowled their way into the game, then bowled their way back out.

Then it was predictably followed by Ryan Rickelton’s dismissal. The pitch had changed, but only for the Aussies it seemed. They are chasing 282, Mitchell Starc has just been as hard to dismiss as prime Shiv Chanderpaul, and now your opener who seems to be seeing the ball well, has nicked a yorker through to the keeper. That is almost impossible to do even on purpose. If you’re a normal cricket fan, you think, maybe this is not your day. But what if you’re South African? This is a sign, the hex, the long cursed history biting you back on the arse again. It is over.

That is what happens to South Africa in the toughest games. In a normal match, it’s runs or harmless dot balls. When the match matters, it’s a wicket.

But something else happened in this one. Even with Wiaan Mulder’s wicket from nowhere, South Africa always looked composed, in control, and like they understood the assignment. Bavuma’s hamstring slowed them down, taking away his superpower of quick running. But it actually seemed to help his batting. He was jittery and excited early on, but now he was crease-bound and smarter. He built the partnership that won this game.

A man dismissed as a token - often by his own fans - was leading the charge, or limp, towards victory.

But it was the man at the other end who really did this. From the moment Aiden Markram came to professional cricket, it looked like he was a future South African captain. He comes from a long line of their oversized batting legends. Physical men who have technical skill, huge reach and big power. But that isn’t everything, South Africa have been making great batters of all sizes since readmission. Before, players like Aubrey Faulkner, Bruce Mitchell and the Nourses had to fight to be called greats. But now they have AB de Villiers, Hashim Amla, Gary Kirsten, Daryll Cullinan, Graeme Smith and Jacques Kallis. They are so good at batting, they have had time to produce greats for other teams.

Markram averages less than all of them; he is the great unfulfilled talent. His nation has been begging for runs, and he’s barely answered the call. But when he does, like the cataclysmic epic at Cape Town, it is like nothing you have ever seen. Who knows what happens if Markram doesn’t play this innings? Maybe someone else steps up, or the wicket was just so flat that the team could still have got them home. But the man who isn’t consistent with his runs has finally been the backbone of what is his country's greatest chase since their first ever win.

That match, England set them 284 runs. South Africa had rarely ever made totals of that size, and at 105 for 6 it seemed over. They fought back, but kept losing wickets, and found themselves 239 for 9. The last wicket just wouldn’t give up, fighting all the way for their 48 excruciating runs. It seems almost off-brand that South Africa began winning at the international level with one of the great clutch heists in history.

They were the team fighting to prove that they belonged. England didn’t even send over full-strength teams; Australia had only toured once. That win made the world realise they were a proper side. It was external.

This win at Lord’s was for them. This was internal; it was about them finally defeating their own darkness.

And it was Markram who took them all the way, until he didn’t. The ball was at off stump. On the first day, the TV commentators talked about how he averaged four in this cycle for deliveries hitting the wickets. Here, he looks anything but afraid and he tries to muscle one more boundary, but he doesn’t quite pick it up. Instead, Travis Head catches it, a fine effort for someone who can struggle in the field. Markram is bereft. He shrugs his arms, almost confused at how he could be out.

He holds the bat above his head as he starts to trudge back. Australians race over to shake his hand and his bat drops to his shoulder, like an axeman exhausted after felling a mighty oak.

Markram picks the bat up and hits his helmet with it. Staring at the wood through his grill. His walk is slow, like he can’t even get himself off the field. He hasn’t really looked up yet, he doesn’t yet realise there are thousands of people at this ground who will carry him from the field. But through his gloom, he finally looks up. The pain of his dismissal leaves and he realises what he has done.

South Africa still have a problem, Hazlewood has given the new ball to another bowler. For any other team, this wouldn’t be an issue. But South Africa still have the fear after Klaasen couldn’t get them over the line.

Someone in the Mound Stand pops a cork, it lands on the ground. In their first Test back after readmission, South African bowler Meyrick Pringle ordered the champagne a day early, and it was the West Indies who ended up drinking it. This time, one of Lord’s security guards, masked as a cork wrangler, rushes onto the field to clear the evidence with two runs to win.

Australia have chosen their final weapon to be Mitchell Starc: one of the winningest winners to ever win. Sure, being born in Australia helps. But Starc in a big game is a problem. He will find a way to make an impact, and when he does, entire nations can be vanquished in an over, as New Zealand found in 2015.

South Africa have found a way to lose to players without his skill, reputation or temperament. And when Kyle Verreynne moves across to scoop, the Australians know it has taken something through to the keeper. Any other South African day, this is out. But not today, and the umpire misses it. The final banana skin from the final boss is jumped, Australia have no reviews, South Africa have no problems.

Marnus fields a ball in the ring, he cocks like he’s going to shy at the stumps, the crowd boos him. Finally, someone born in South Africa on the losing side, but it’s a good thing. The winning shot is when Starc goes for the magic ball and Verreynne gets the toe end of the bat, but finds the gap.

‘South Africa won by five wickets.’ A small sentence that packs an emotional punch.

The crowd scream in celebration and relief. It isn’t the cheers at the end of day three; it is a bellowing of frustration from a lifetime of heartbreak. An Australian fan in the front of the crowd is not upset, he merely turns around and films them. His team has lost, but he might never have been surrounded by this much happiness before. The South African balcony is jumping and hugging each other.

All except one man, Temba Bavuma. He doesn’t get up at all. He stays in his chair, clapping his team, like it was a well-run two in a club match. A short while later, he is walking around the outfield.

In his right arm is his son, wearing his cap, and in the left is the mace. His mace, their mace. The crowd chants ‘Oh, Temba Bavuma’ again.

But this isn’t just one man’s win, this is a cricket nation that, before this was brought together by failure. Now, they are taking their entire lap of honour together. The players are behind him, but not just them, support staff, family and friends. A cast of thousands, the people we don’t see when the players usually lose those matches. And it isn’t just those on the ground. The team keep finding people they know over the boundary, so every few yards a player breaks free of the pack and runs over to see their friends.

There are grandmothers and grandchildren with everyone in between, celebrating their win.

It could not be clearer that 11 people didn’t win this, this has proper history. Krom Hendriks, Jimmy Sinclair, Neil Adcock, the Pollocks, Abdurahman ‘Lefty’ Adams, Clive Rice, Basil D’Oliveira, Ismail “Baboo” Ebrahim, Shabnim Ismail, Paul Adams, Marizanne Kapp, Bob Woolmer, the schools, the clubs, and the coaches won this. It was a moment for all of them. A proud cricket culture, finding its happiest day.

During their victory lap, Keshav Maharaj goes over to pick up a protea from the crowd and give it back to his family to hold.

Proteas flower during the spring. Their florets are a pinky red, but it has a cream colour in the middle. They don’t grow alone, they are pollinated by birds, insects and the wind. They can self-pollinate at times, but they are at their best when they cross-pollinate from other plants, meaning there is more genetic diversity in the population. But like all flowers, they need the sun.

For a long time, South Africa played cricket under dark skies, often of its own making on and off the field. Today, the sun came out, and it has never been brighter.