The Chef
Tony de Zorzi has announced himself in white ball cricket.
When he reached 50, Tony de Zorzi didn’t know what to do in celebration, so he held his bat up to show a sticker with his YouTube channel’s name. The Daily de Zorzi channel is the only sponsor he has. Maybe it’s time other sponsors took notice of him.
The St. George's Park Brass Band raised the volume by a few decibels as Tony de Zorzi completed the single. The atmosphere was electric. The spectators’ cheers grew louder when he turned for the second run. De Zorzi had just reached 101 runs in ODIs. He pumped the air in joy. He turned to the Proteas’ dugout, took his helmet off, flipped it upside down and made a pot-stirring motion with his bat in celebration.
The celebration is from his club cricket days. "It was for a friend of mine that had to stop playing cricket. He used to call me the sauce. And I guess some people will also say it means, 'He's cooking'," de Zorzi shared during the post-match press conference. De Zorzi further explained that the friend, Roger, was alive and well, to prevent any misunderstanding.
For those not familiar with the phrase ‘he’s cooking’, it means this guy is doing something great. And seeing as the Proteas already have another player answering to Sauce, de Zorzi might just have to embrace the second meaning. He is now ‘The Chef’.
It is fitting because de Zorzi was the head chef during South Africa’s innings. He cooked India’s bowling, after a period of discomfort in the kitchen and garnished the Proteas’ innings with a six that took him to an unbeaten 119 off 112 deliveries. A maiden ODI century in his fourth 50-over match. He has made his intentions in ODI cricket, and as Linda says in Death of a Salesman: “Attention must be paid.”
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De Zorzi has taken the scenic route to get to this point, “The path I took allowed me to learn about my game and I think, more importantly, I think it gave me an opportunity to learn about myself.”
He knew from an early age he wanted to be a professional athlete. For a while, he thought about being a football player. That dream died when he was 13 when he realised he wouldn’t cut it as a pro. He flirted with the idea of pursuing rugby. “I played a bit of first-team rugby KES and some provincial rugby, but I don't think it was possible for me, to be honest. You have to do a self-assessment. And I don’t think I had the gas to break the line and stay in front. So I had to be honest with myself,” says de Zorzi.
He might have paid these other sports a bit of attention, but his love was always cricket. From the day Messrs. Murray and Monroe introduced the game to him in primary school. “They helped me fall in love with the game and always encouraged us to work hard. One of my earliest memories is there was no set team. So on Fridays, we did a couple of training sets and whoever worked the hardest in those drills and finished first earned a spot in the batting lineup. That work hard and earn your spot approach stuck with me,” says de Zorzi.
His cricket education continued at King Edward VII High School, the alma mater of Graeme Smith and Quinton de Kock, two other left-handers with centuries opening for the Proteas in one-day cricket. But, unlike Smith and de Kock, de Zorzi did not have a flying start KES. But, once he got comfortable, he was unstoppable.
“Throughout his first team career he showed great glimpses of his ability and it was probably towards the end of his time at KES where he flourished alongside a very strong team and he led them very well,” says Ryan Cook, de Zorzi’s coach at KES.
The turning point came towards the end of de Zorzi’s Grade 11 year. KES was playing against Parktown Boy’s High. De Zorzi came into that match on the back of a rough patch, probably the worst in his KES career. That lean period was punctuated by a few outbursts, almost all of them directed at himself. “ He was not quite getting the performances that he would be hoping for. And as most young men of that age, he was emotional, especially at times of disappointment,” Cook recalls.
One time, de Zorzi was dismissed just before he reached a half-century. The milestone would have helped him remove the shackles of underperforming. He unleashed his frustration on a special red chair that Cook liked to sit on during team meetings. “I couldn't believe it. I think I had probably played a stupid shot or something. And then, in my rage or anger and silliness, I turned and hit the chair. It broke into pieces,” says de Zorzi.
It’s a memory he can laugh at now. He is no longer as emotional as he was back then. There is still the occasional swearing and punching of the pads. Against India, that side of him surfaced. In the 35th over, de Zorzi didn’t make the contact he wanted with a short delivery from Tilak Varma, and as he ran the single, he tapped himself on the helmet in irritation.
“I look at a guy like (Zubayr) Hamza. When he gets out, he kind of just takes his helmet off, looks at it and then packs his bag and I'm just like, ‘Jeez, I'd love to be like that all the time’,” says de Zorzi. If his recent reactions to dismissals are anything to go by, he is more than halfway there.
In the match against Parktown, Grant Roelofsen scored a double hundred and Liam Smith scored a ton of his own. With a solid platform laid, de Zorzi played his shots for an unbeaten 50. KES declared immediately after he reached the milestone. “It was only a half-century, but the way he played was outstanding, and the confidence that innings gave him was great. I think was a bit of a watershed moment for him,” says Cook.
To underline that fact, de Zorzi began his Grade 12 with a trio of consecutive centuries. For the first time, everyone sat up and paid attention to his abilities. He would go on to make the SA Under-19 team but did not do as well as he would have liked. He was not one of the stars of that outfit. But he did enough to earn himself a cricket bursary to Tuks, where his star shined brightly in Varsity cricket.
“I met Tony during a training session at Tuks one day. He was batting and I watched him play and was really impressed. We had a brief chat afterwards and it was clear that he was a young man with a mature head on his shoulders. He is intelligent and you could see that he understands his game,” says Albie Morkel, who did not hesitate to invite the young man to join the Titans.
De Zorzi did not take long before he vindicated Morkel’s scouting abilities. Shortly after signing for the Titans, de Zorzi was part of the touring squad that went to Dubai for a T20 tournament. Morkel captained that team. In a match that everyone on that tour always recalls, de Zorzi carved a match-winning unbeaten 106 off 57. Brian Lara, who was in attendance, was heard asking, ‘Who is this kid?’
After the match, the West Indies legend met with the then-21-year-old de Zorzi for a chat, a moment de Zorzi describes as surreal. One of cricket’s greatest batters had sat up and paid attention to his abilities. Five years later, it’s time for the rest of the world’s turn to sit up and pay attention to the all-grown-up Tony de Zorzi.
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Thanks for reading. Until next time… - CS