Anyone for ... cricket? Enthusiasts go to bat for their sport
Bruce Emond The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
Most local sports lovers have no problem rattling off the names of European soccer's leading lights, the towering titans of U.S. basketball and one or two of tennis' shining stars.
But they would be stumped to describe what cricket is all about, let alone who are the sport's top men at the wicket.
Without the sporting legacy of former British colonies such as the Indian subcontinent and Sri Lanka, they cannot quite make head or tail of the strange terminology -- wickets, innings, overs, lbw -- and the laid-back goings-on played out on the field.
Ricky, a 36-year-old Jakarta sports lover who often burns the midnight oil to watch Italian and English soccer games, confesses that cricket is one sport that fails to draw his interest.
"I really don't know much about it, not even how many players are on a side or the scoring system," said the private company employee.
He may well be surprised to learn that cricket has its own dedicated followers in the capital, a small but passionate group that is trying to bring the game to the wider audience of Indonesians.
Last weekend, they turned out as the finalists for the JCA Kabelvision Cricket League were decided, with Senayan CC to take on Ceylon CC at the Ceylon Cricket Ground in Cibubur, East Jakarta, on May 8.
There are sketchy records of cricket being played in the country from the 1880s to 1960s, according to Noel Matthews, a British student at the University of Indonesia's School of Cultural Sciences, who wrote his 2004 final coursework paper on the history and development of the sport here.
He noted anecdotal evidence of games being played from after World War II until the mid-1960s in the area where the National Monument now stands.
However, it is only in the last 25 years that expatriates have brought their love of the game to various areas of the country, from Bali to Kupang, East Nusa Tenggara, and especially Jakarta with the establishment of the Jakarta Cricket Association (JCA) in 1992.
The first Jakarta cricket league began that same year with eight teams; today, about 10 teams compete on at least half a dozen grounds in the capital and West Java.
John Stevenson, who is a board member of the JCA and the Indonesian Cricket Foundation (ICF), said there were about 150 people on 10 teams in Jakarta, and from 50-60 players in Bali. In Jakarta, most of the participants are Indians and Pakistanis, with a mix of other expatriates rounding out the group.
While the JCA has concentrated on developing cricket in Jakarta, the ICF, founded in 2000, is intent on getting Indonesians, especially kids, hooked on the sport.
"The ICF has focused very much on teaching and coaching Indonesians, to train them in the game and then they can coach others in schools," said Stevenson, an Australian expatriate who is also the captain of the Indonesian squad.
"To that degree, the foundation has chosen a number of young people and sent them to Australia to train."
Four Indonesian coaches are now working full time on visiting schools to teach teachers and students about the game. Stevenson estimates that about 10,000 children have already learned the basics through the program.
The next goal is to create a more professional structure for the ICF, Stevenson said, including bringing the government and sponsors on board.
With Indonesia lacking a historical legacy in the sport and with the airwaves saturated with soccer, basketball and boxing broadcasts, Stevenson knows it will be no easy task.
Yet it's a labor of love for him.
"People like me are so passionate about the game. It teaches you about teamwork, dedication and friendship, the core values to having a successful life. For somebody like me, who has played since the age of five, it's part of my blood, like badminton or sepak takraw for others."
He believes that Indonesia, with a huge, relatively young population of 215 million, has enough homegrown talent to produce competitive teams.
"Indonesians' physical structure is more suited (to cricket) than that of some other Asians. Indonesians tend to be taller and stronger, and they have good hand-eye coordination. And they also have time on their hands."
His personal dream is for the emergence of "kampong cricket" where kids take whatever objects are at hand -- a stick, broom handle, tennis ball, small rock -- to play the game in their spare time.
"I passionately believe there is an opportunity to develop cricket here. The prime objective is not to earn money -- we'll never be basketball or soccer -- but teach them the love of the game."