How will the cost of Russia’s war be calculated once the guns have fallen silent across Ukraine? The most horrific measurements will be lost lives and devastated houses, but the tendrils of trauma will stretch into every nook of society.
How can we assess the long-term consequences of a bombed-out Mariupol theatre? Or a crater that was once a school in Kharkiv? Or from the tens of thousands of musicians, singers, poets, and athletes who no longer have a stage to perform on, or an audience to be touched by their art?
As we survey the damage, it’s tempting to speculate on the fate of a cricket ball in the country.
However, the Ukrainian Cricket Federation (UCF) may be counted among the dead when the war’s casualties are tallied.
UCF Statement
“We’re fighting for our lives,” says UCF President and CEO Kobus Olivier. “I’m not sure we’ll make it. However, we have hope.
Ukraine’s people have not abandoned their homeland. To safeguard it, they are battling and dying. The Ukrainian people have an incredible spirit. We have reason to hope because of them.”
South African Native
Olivier, a South African native who has worked in a variety of roles in cricket, including coaching in Cape Town, serving as Cricket Kenya’s CEO, and co-founding a successful academy in Dubai with Ravichandran Ashwin, had no intention of staying in Kyiv after arriving in 2018.
He needed a vacation from the heat and the daily grind, so he travelled to a nation where there was knee-deep snow and no cricket. The capital of Ukraine was the ideal location.
Oliver the who survived
He’d left the game and was now working as an English teacher at a private school. But he couldn’t stay away for long. He continues, “Cricket enters your bloodstream and stays there.” He introduced cricket to his children before attending UCF. Since 2000, the UCF has been running cricket in Ukraine.
He didn’t depart right away. He had accumulated enough provisions to last three months in the previous weeks and planned to wait out the assault. “Cricket is keeping me in Ukraine,” he told the BBC hours after the initial assault. As the bombardment on the outskirts of Kyiv continued and the battle in the surrounding towns of Bucha and Irpin increased, he realised he had no choice but to evacuate..
Olivier’s flight from Kyiv to Zagreb, Croatia, gained international notice due to stops in Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary. Not least because his four travelling companions, Tickey, Ollie, Kaya, and Jessie, are little dogs he describes as “like children.”
He’s appeared on international terrestrial television, is currently filming a documentary on his adventure with the amusingly called production business “Killer Puppy Media,” and is writing a book about his cricket career and the fight for survival at the University of Central Florida.
At the ICC’s AGM in July, the UCF will learn whether it has been given associate membership status. Despite the difficulties, Olivier sends an expressive letter to ICC Chairman Greg Barclay, which has been viewed by Cricbuzz.
“What happened was not our responsibility,” says Olivier, “and we cannot be held accountable.” “Every rule has been observed. We have a strong youth programme, a senior international team, and were planning to play our first international match this year [perhaps against Sweden’s Jonty Rhodes]. We can be optimistic because Afghanistan is still a full member of the International Cricket Council and plays cricket despite being in the midst of a conflict.
Edited by: Khushi Thakur
Published by: Aditya Negi
