Barabati Stadium and Bedders' Dream

Money is not the only (or best) motive

A year and half ago David Bedingham received a phone call which changed his career if not his life. Like many young cricketers Bedingham grew up dreaming about playing Test cricket but, two years ago, had pretty much accepted that his hopes were gone.

He had even considered using his hereditary British passport to qualify for England but he would have been 33-years-old by the time he was eligible and that would almost certainly have been too late.

So, he knuckled down to become the best player he could be for Durham in the County Championship, was twice voted the county’s ‘Player of the Year’ and has averaged just over 50 in first-class cricket. Before he left Western Province to take up full-time employment in England his coach, Ashwell Prince, bemoaned his loss to SA cricket insisting he was “exactly the sort of player we should be trying to keep in this country.”

Then the SA20 happened and a butterfly effect kicked in which resulted in Bedingham not only fulfilling his dream of playing Test cricket but playing in the final of the tournament he was required to ‘give up’ in order to do so.

The phone call, of course, was from Test coach Shukri Conrad who was doing his best to gather a respectable squad together for a two-match series in New Zealand a year ago with the country’s best 50 players contracted to the SA20 and therefore unavailable for Test selection. Bedingham said ‘yes’ but Conrad explained that he would need to withdraw his name from the SA20 Player Auction to ensure he won a Test cap.

Bedingham wasn’t guaranteed a bid in the SA20 but the likelihood was that he would be acquired by one of the teams and even a ‘medium’ category contract would have been more lucrative than the tour fee and appearance money for two Tests, which is all Conrad could guarantee him. In other words, take your name out of the hat, play two Tests while the running the risk of never playing another – and missing the SA20 boat.

Bedingham took the ‘risk’ because the Test cap meant that much to him and because he has a more grounded sense of priorities than most cricketers - he might not have had a career at all having lost a full year convalescing after a car-crash in his early 20s. But also because the potential downside was softened by the assurance from Durham that his place in their future plans was secure. His hard work, dedication and loyalty (and runs) had earned him that insurance.

Bedingham played in New Zealand, scored a century in the second Test to secure his place and, fitness permitting, will play in the final of the World Test Championship at Lord’s in June. At the third SA20 Auction his services were secured by the Sunrisers Eastern Cape for whom he was mainstay and he played in the final at the Wanderers three days ago.

By pursuing job satisfaction and what made him happy, the money took care of itself. Bedingham got lucky, no doubt, but he also contributed to his good fortune by choosing to be in the best physical and mental state to play to the best of his ability. Some sportsmen are motivated primarily by money, a few exclusively so, but the majority are not able to perform at their best for a sustained period of time unless they are pursuing and playing for something else.

*Flight delays are common in India for a variety of reasons. The mechanics fiddled, prodded and poked at the handle to the cockpit for half an hour before taking the practical decision to give up. Evidently it wasn’t going to be fixed and they grew weary of 150 irritable passengers staring at them for just over half an hour.

In a wonderful moment of BRICS ingenuity, they weighed up the likelihood of a passenger barging into the cockpit and harrassing the captain or his co-pilot during the flight against the inconvenience of further delaying the take-off. And came up with quickest compromise they could muster. Nobody would be peeling that off in a hurry…