Old Mutual Cricket Academy celebrates 10 years of excellence

SPORTS academies have played a huge role in helping upcoming youngsters reach the top of the world in their chosen fields, and making sure that they reach their maximum capabilities.

They come with a lot of advantages to youngsters willing to grow their game and become world class players by nurturing their talents. From high level coaching offered by experts to the best facilities, which you wouldn’t get anywhere else.

Some of the finest talents in the world have come through academies and Zimbabwe has also had similar structures. Some of the most popular academies in the country include Aces Youth Academy which groomed the likes of Knowledge Musona, Khama Billiat and George Chigova. It has been considered as one of the best developmental projects in the country.

In football, Aces Academy stands tall and in cricket, Bulawayo’s very own, Old Mutual Academy of Cricket Excellence (former Heath Streak Academy) rose through the ranks, as not just a hub of identifying talent but also a place where talent is nurtured.

Starting under a programme named “My dream, my vision”, this year marks 10 years since the academy, which was first named after the late Zimbabwe Cricket icon, Streak was first incepted and has been crucial in the growth and development of grassroots cricket, not only in Bulawayo but the country at large.

The idea was to spread the game into the western suburb schools where it was not popular as it was considered a sport played only in the “A” schools. The academy’s founding chairperson, and current vice-president Elifasi Mashaba said it all began as an idea to try and spread cricket to everyone in the city and is happy with the progress made so far, which is evidenced by Emakhandeni-based Mtshingwe Primary School winning two tournaments that were held last week as part of their celebrations.

The Tyson Meki-coached Mtshingwe Primary School won the Old Mutual Colts Cricket Cup and the CABS Under-13 Cricket Cup to make it a memorable event for the school and Mashaba said they are grateful to their sponsors who have walked this 10-year journey with them.

“We set off to identify and nurture talent in underprivileged schools because cricket was considered as an elite sport played in “A” schools and alongside the late hero Heath Streak and Joseph Rego we came up with the idea to take the sport to western schools.

“We had a vision to try and involve youngsters whom we believed had the desire to play cricket but never got the exposure. We are happy that corporates joined in to help identify the talent and we have a league where they sponsor schools with kits. A lot of them identify with the schools and we are thankful to Old Mutual, because of them, we are able to nurture a lot of youngsters,” said Mashaba.

Rego is the academy’s president and board chairperson.

Over the past, the academy has had players from different schools around the city go on tours to countries such as South Africa, Zambia, Botswana and as far as India, something which Mashaba believes plays a huge role in helping them grow and develop their skills through the exposure. Apart from helping the country’s next great stars, the academy also seeks to assist teachers in schools with cricket knowledge.

“The youngsters have enjoyed good exposure. We have also been able to spread cricket activities well, there is good growth. We also have managed to give some teachers in schools the opportunity to train from some international players who visit the academy,” said Mashaba.

With growing and developing talent being their core business, the dream for the academy is to have some of the players, both boys and girls going all the way to don the national colours for Zimbabwe at the international arena, following the footsteps of the legendary Streak who succumbed to cancer at the age of 49.

Streak was an integral part of cricket development in the city with his ability to speak Ndebele fluently being an advantage, making it easy for him to connect with most youngsters who looked up to him. He played a role in the introduction of the game mostly, in Western suburbs.

As a means of honouring his legacy, as one of Zimbabwe’s greatest ever cricketers, Mashaba said they hope that one day, the academy will be renamed back as Heath Streak Academy.

“Our dream is to hear that so and so is now playing for Zimbabwe from the academy and be as good as Heath Streak. As a board, it is our desire that one day, we rename the grounds back to Heath Streak so that his legacy lives on,” he said.

CABS Managing Director, Mehluli Mpofu said the academy and the tournaments that it hosts are important to them as an organisation as they seek to support communities that they operate in and helping spread the game of cricket is one way of doing so. He added that they will continue supporting the growth of cricket in the country and other sports.

“It’s been a decade of supporting cricket. In this case, we are supporting the young, so it’s very developmental which obviously supports the growth of cricket in the country and particularly when you deal with disadvantaged people and give them an opportunity to actually grow in the sport, it becomes very important to us as a business because ultimately what we always say to ourselves is we ought to be supportive of the community that we operate in and that is one way of doing so.

“And, the commitment that we are giving as CABS and Old Mutual Group is that we will continue to support cricket and we will continue to look for other opportunities to support grassroots cricket and in other sports we need to look at how we can play a part as well,” said Mpofu.

Having been focusing mainly on schools around Bulawayo, Mashaba said their goal going forward is to spread the game to the rural areas and make sure that it reaches far and wide places. The academy has played a part in creating a wider base of cricket participation at elementary level.

The ground has also been used as a practice venue by international teams with the latest being the United States of America (USA) who had come in for the International Cricket Council (ICC) Men’s Cricket World Cup Qualifiers in July.

Some of the players who have helped with coaching youngsters at the academy include, Gavin Ewing, John Nyumbu, national cricket women’s team player Tasmeen Granger, Goodwill Mamhiyo and developmental coaches Chris Phiri and Trevor Phiri. — @brandon_malvin.