Cricket South Africa and their provincial unions continues to
look for new ways that they can improve on the experience at the week for the
boys. This year is no exception as the KwaZulu-Natal Inland region adds new
awards to the week to make it more memorable for the boys.
Morgan Pillay has been the Tournament Director of the Khaya
Majola Cricket Week for the last 23 years in a row and, because the week is
always scheduled to incorporate the 16th December holiday, and Morgan’s
birthday is on 18TH December, that means he has not been at home his
birthday for almost a quarter of a century.
He’s there again this year as the 2019 week takes place in his
home province of KwaZulu-Natal Inland, centred at Michaelhouse, with matches
also being played at Hilton College, St Charles, Weston Agricultural school and
the Pietermaritzburg Oval
“The week has always featured the most talented cricketers in
the under-19 age group, but many other things have changed since my one as
tournament director, in Boksburg in 1996,” he said. “In the process we have
created a world class stage that allows all cricketers to showcase their
talent. There’s no question that this is the finest high school cricket
tournament in the world.”
The boys are being housed at the schools, in luxurious
accommodation, with good healthy food and first class facilities. Everything
has been sorted so all that the players have to do it play their best cricket,
make friends and have a wonderful experience, Pillay said. “All of the schools
have gone out of their way to prepare their schools to the best of their
abilities to make sure that the tournament runs smoothly.”
There have been a lot of changes to the tournament during
Pillay’s time. “For example, when I took over the tournament the umpires and scorers
were school children, Now we have qualified umpires and scorers and Cricket
South Africa supply a manager to look after the umpires and assessors to make
sure that the scorers and umpires do their jobs correctly.”
CSA use the week as training for their scorers and umpires,
while providing the players with a top class service. This also creates an
incentive for the scorers and the umpires to be at the week.
“The top players from each cricketing region come to the
tournament and this allows the boys to measure themselves against their peers
from across the country top boys in other regions,” Pillay said. “This
allows the players to meet others who they would not usually get to mix with.
They can make friendships that can last for life.”
This year the LOC from KwaZulu-Natal decided that they needed to
add something to the tournament that will make the tournament different from
the others in the past.
They added the awards for the best bowling and batting
performance for each day, they would recognize batsmen with awards for all of
the centuries scored and the fastest century of the tournament.
To recognize the bowlers they added awards for all of the 5
wicket hauls and hat-tricks during the week.
Finally they looked at what the tournament means for a lot of
the kids and that is making lifelong friendships and enjoying a memorable week
so they added a fair play award for the player that was best in playing the
game in the spirit of the game.
These awards will be given out at the awards ceremony on Friday
evening together with the player of the tournament, the leading wicket taker,
the leading run scorer and the best all-rounder awards.
