Deafening music pumps from the red Toyota Tazz parked outside a house in KwaDwesi, Port Elizabeth. On the back window is a homemade poster, “LONWABO TSOTSOBE Welcoming Party”.
The Proteas’ new bowling sensation laughs as he gets out of the car and straightens to his full 1,95-metre height. “I’ve pimped it a bit. Do you want to hear?” he asks, throwing open all the doors.
A friend is organising the official party at a local club but friends are calling here at the home of his sister, Nomsebenzi. We’re talking on the stoep about his first one-day international (ODI) recently at Perth’s famous Waca ground where 24-year-old “Lopsy” took three wickets and a catch off his own bowling to help demolish the Aussies.
“It was a great day I’ll always remember,” he says.
Lonwabo comes from a sporting family. Until last year Nomsebenzi was captain of the SA women’s rugby team and his elder brother, Langa, plays for the Spring Rose rugby club in PE. His father, Toto (who died when Lonwabo was young) was in the first national nonracial rugby team that played France in 1975 with Morne du Plessis as captain.
His mom, Dorothy, a human resources manager at the department of health, was a good netball and softball player in her day.
Lonwabo has wanted to play for the Proteas for as long as he can remember and his next goal is a permanent contract. He had his first taste of international cricket when he toured Australia with the SA development team in 2007. He also played for the Proteas in the first Twenty20 match in Melbourne last December, taking a wicket.
But the biggest honour was his Waca debut, he says. It was at the same venue where his mentor, Makhaya Ntini, made his debut in 1998, also taking three wickets.
Being part of the tour is a valuable experience even if you’re just carrying experienced players’ bags, Lonwabo says. “It was a privilege for me to go along and see how the older players did things. And I took in everything they said, then went off to practise in the nets.”
