NEIL MANTHORP: If cricket is art, Test cricket is the game’s fine art and classical music

The government is far from alone in grouping sports with the arts at departmental level.

There are many ministers of sport, art and culture worldwide and, counterintuitive as it may seem to many people on many levels, there are obviously enough similarities to administer them with the same department.

The arts are subsidised in every country on earth that is able to feed itself. The arts are deemed important enough to most countries’ heritage to be encouraged. Galleries, museums and music festivals don’t all make money — most wouldn’t even come close to breaking even without private sponsors and national subsidies.

They are also not charities. Corporates and governments don’t give money to the arts simply because they need it to survive. They do so because there are spin-offs in the national interest. Tourism is the obvious, most quantifiable one but there are economists with complicated algorithms who claim to measure the positives of a population feeling proud of their nation’s success on an international stage.

Pride and competitive success leads to more happy, healthy people, apparently, and they cost less to look after. It is why countries such as New Zealand, Australia, the Netherlands and Ireland invest so heavily in the Olympic sports and overachieve as a result with chest-thumping medals-to-population ratios.

So, for the sake of conformity, let’s assume that cricket is art — and that it needs all forms of it to produce the highest-selling, most populist versions. Cartoonists are often classically trained artists and almost all the world’s highest-selling pop and rock stars learnt piano or violin as children. But, as far as I’m aware, there are no serious advocates of Peanuts and Taylor Swift being the sole or even dominant art and music on the education curriculum.

Test cricket is the game’s fine art and classical music, and three fabulous series are about to start in the next week or so, two of which involve the “big three” nations. The first of five Tests in the Australia vs India Border-Gavaskar Trophy begins in Perth on Friday, while England’s three-Test tour of New Zealand gets under way in Christchurch six days after that.

SA’s clash against Sri Lanka, potentially pivotal in deciding who plays in the World Test Championship final in June 2025, probably against Australia, starts on November 27 — a Wednesday. And there are only two Tests.

There are those who say the big three give Test cricket the most respect because they can afford to, literally. But it’s those who cannot afford to play the game who probably need to play it most. A word with the minister, please.

• The second division of Cricket SA’s Four-Day Series is as about as far away from Test cricket as the first-class game can get. Surviving, for now, on a whim and prayer, the players and their provinces will scrap for every point in a desperate attempt for promotion to division one and possible survival when the inevitable cull happens in a season or two.

A little bit of “scorecard mining” is required to even follow the competition, but it’s often worth the time with stories being unearthed like golden nuggets. The recently concluded match between SWD and KZN Inland in Oudtshoorn (Garden Route Badgers vs Tuskers if you prefer) is a vivid example.

The home side batted first and declared their first innings on 98/8. Nos 10 and 11, Khwezi Gumede and Sintu Majeza, average 2.77 and 1.75 in 20 and 17 matches respectively. The odds on them adding 52 to reach 150 and earn a batting bonus point were slim. But by declaring, the Badgers denied Inland a fourth bowling point. Sneaky.

But the Tuskers replied with 441 and won by six-wickets despite SWD’s much-improved second innings of 475, so all was well. The “Sneakies” lost.

Such tactics in the lower reaches of first-class cricket, away from prying eyes, are far more common than in higher-profile matches. Indeed, it was KZN Inland who caused a mighty (but hardly noticed) furore 14 years ago in the Cricket SA Three-Day Challenge when they declared their own first innings on 29/6 against Boland in Paarl!

Threats of formal investigations and recriminations abounded before opening bowlers Keegan Eccles (6/47) and Byron Whatmore (4/54) dismissed Boland for 160. Cody Chetty (109) and Eccles (86) saw the visitors to 390 second time around and the home side were dismissed for 179 in pursuit of 260, giving Inland a remarkable, dice-rolling victory by 80-runs.

It’s tough at the top of the Test match pyramid but anyone who says there aren’t teeth and nails involved in the game’s basement fights obviously hasn’t seen any — or indulged themselves with a bit of mining.