Abstract
Sport is just not cricket any more. Seems like just yesterday the only way weJohannesburg folk could follow a nail-biting international rugby test happening atNewlands in Cape Town was by listening to Gerhard Viviers' commentary on Afrikaansradio. I remember my grandfather sitting on the stoep, a map of the playing fielddrawn on a large sheet of paper on his lap, plotting team moves, attacks, defences andscores, as Gerhard's staccato commentary poured through the speakers of an old Grundigmedium wave receiver next to him; definitely a case of what Marshall Mcluhan wouldcall 'a very cool medium'.In the days before mass media, the sports message sent to those absent from theaction on the field contained little else of fact other than a score, and a winner, andthe message reached the receiver a day, a week or a month later. Messages then graduallyexpanded to include match details and perhaps a grainy photograph or two as newspapersstarted reporting on sport. Radio revolutionised sport in that it provided the impetusfor the massification of sport as teams and individuals developed followings, and theconcept of 'the fan' was born. Radio truly took sports matches beyond the stadiumgates for the first time.
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