Cricket Namibia wins top international award

CRICKET Namibia received international recognition on Monday when it was announced that they had won the International Cricket Council’s Associate Member Men’s Performance of the Year award.

According to an ICC press release, the award was for their excellent victory against Hong Kong in the ICC World Cricket League Division 2 tournament in Windhoek in April last year.

That victory secured Namibia One Day International (ODI) status for the first time in 16 years and a place in the Men’s Cricket World Cup League 2 tournament, which is a qualifier for the 2023 World Cup.

That triumph led to more success as Namibia went on to win the tournament after beating Oman in the final, but their biggest prize came in October when they qualified for the T20 World Cup in Dubai.

It was the first time that Namibia had qualified for a World Cup in 16 years, but it was its newfound ODI status which made a significant impact on cricket and professional sport in Namibia, as CEO Johan Muller explained.

“The qualification meant that we can have 17 players on full-time contracts and through this we became the only sporting code in Namibia that turned professional. The fact that high-quality cricket content will now be played on home soil has led to an increase in exposure to the game, which aids the growth of our development programmes,” he said.

At a well-attended press conference on Monday, Muller congratulated the team, as well as leadership of Cricket Namibia.

“This is a significant award which was contested by 92 associate member countries, so it’s a wonderful achievement for the players and the country as a whole,” he said.

“We are now ranked amongst the top 20 in ODI and T20 cricket, while our women last year made the World Cup qualifier as the second-ranked team in Africa,” he added.

Muller said that more than 26 000 children formed part of Cricket Namibia’s development programme, with nearly half of that being female, while 220 coaches were spreading the game to nine regions of the country.

National captain Gerhard Erasmus highlighted the work of coach Pierre de Bruyn for instilling “a hard-working, disciplined culture” and added:

“To gain ODI status and qualify for the T20 World Cup in the same year are magnificent achievements of which we are extremely proud. Credit must go to every administrator, board member and player who set up and fostered the game in the country for the last 20 years. Our team has proven this year that they can compete against higher ranked, competitive teams in the world.”

The president of Cricket Namibia, Dr Rudie van Vuuren said it was great news for the country as a whole.

“In a time when we need good news, this is the right treatment for us and the country as a whole. I had to postpone personal things to be here today, because I was part of this journey. It’s basically the same group of players that we had two and a half years ago, the only difference is that they’ve trimmed down and lost half their weight,” he said to much mirth.

“We’ve created a culture where we’ve got a fantastic coach, a great CEO and a great team. Better people make better players and that’s the result that we got – the performance of the year. As Johan said, 92 teams competed for this trophy and a small country like ours with only 2,4 million people punched way above its weight to win this trophy and we are very proud of this team,” he said.