The Blue Book

The Blue Book A History of Western Province Cricket, 1890–2011

This book provides the first comprehensive and complete history of Western Province cricket and the Cape Cobras in the 121 years from 1890 to 2011.It goes beyond any similar sports history in South Africa to date, to reveal the rich history of cricket in a region with the longest tradition of playing in the country and the continent.

Based on decades of painstaking research, it overturns old, exclusive ‘official’ accounts of the past and introduces us to a wealth of new material about players, clubs and matches that were previously ‘off field’.

With its 20 000 cricketers, part-owned Cape Cobras franchise and the famous 123-year-old Sahara Park Newlands Stadium, the Western Province Cricket Association has inherited the oldest tradition of cricket in South Africa.

"Cape Town has a legacy of cricket going back more than 200 years, but it was onlyon 25 June 1991 that all the cricketers in the province united for the first time toform the Western Province Cricket Association (WPCA), the first single controlling  body for cricket in the region. Unity was made possible by the dramatic political changes in the early 1990s. On 11 February 1990 Nelson Mandela walked through the prison doors to freedom and negotiations for a new political dispensation commenced. On 27 April 1994 the first democratic elections were held. Two weeks later Mandela became President. In a relatively short time, a remarkable turnabout had occurred in the political history of South Africa.

Developments in cricket mirrored the broader changes taking place. By the end of the 1980s cricketers were deeply polarised. But, coinciding with the political turnabout, the rebel tours which were propping up apartheid sport were brought to an end and the SouthAfrican Cricket union (SACU) sought to negotiate with the South African Cricket Board(SACB) through the offices of the newly unbanned ANC."

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