Sept. 9: Its eardrum-piercing blare was aural tourture for the players at the 2010 Fifa World Cup, and for the fans watching at home. But for the spectators who were blowing them with all their might, the cacophony was pure bliss. The vuvuzelas in the space of four weeks became the defining sound, shape and buzzword of Africa’s first World Cup, with even Fifa boss Sepp Blatter advocating their use at matches.
However, with the Champions League Twenty20 governing council banning them, the next 16 days of this year’s edition in South Africa beginning Friday will be eerily silent. “It’s a nuisance. When the tournament is trying to carve an identity of its own, we can’t afford to put off our viewers,” Cricket South Africa chief executive Gerard Majola told this newspaper on Thursday.
Much like most cricket events around the world, the 2010 Champions League has been designed to fit the Indian fans’ needs. All matches involving the Indian teams have been slotted at primetime, while the rest have been scattered randomly. In this strategically-planned scheduling, it’s the South Africans — majority of whom relate the sound to the herd of trumpeting elephants — who lose out.
Noise can clock in at up to 127 decibel, affecting communication on and off the field. But despite the obvious drawbacks, the vuvuzelas have been has been part of Rainbow Nation’s sporting culture for some time. It became a permanent fixture of South African football in 1990s, emitting a single, wobbling B note that has energised some teams and driven others to distraction.
“It’s a belief here among many rugby and football fans that rivals can be taken out similar to how a baboon can be driven by making lots of noise... it’s a folklore,” said Majola. “But it has never been tried in cricket.” Majola said that the decision to silence the horns came after several failed attempts to cut them out of live feeds.
“We consulted German engineers who said they’d be able to add an inverse track in the feed, which would nullify the noise. But it didn’t work.” South Africa will be quieter, more cricket-oriented this September, but there will always be a few who’ll be sorry their vuvuzelas are in cold storage.