See no evil, hear no evil

Heath Streak can have no illusions about the dreadful things that happen in Zimbabwe. Last August his father was jailed because he refused to give up his farm to Robert Mugabe's licensed thugs. But his refusal to make a political statement during the World Cup seemed to put him on the government's side. Despite his own intimate understanding of widespread hunger and repression, his silence appeared to imply criticism of the brave black-armband protests of team-mates Andy Flower and Henry Olonga. Streak became known among opposition supporters as the Anti-Flower.

Heath Streak: now considered less as a hero and more as an enigma Getty Images

His reputation for having deserted the side of the angels started before the World Cup when Streak sounded strident and uncompromising. Here was a man who spoke only of sporting performance while all around him people were trying to survive the state-sponsored famine of Mugabe. His defence was lame. "I believe sport and politics can't mix," he said. "The security of teams coming here is perfect. I think things should go ahead."

In retrospect it might seem not to have been worth it. During the World Cup the team, distracted by the controversy, suffered. Despite making the Super Six stage, partly due to England's refusal to play in Harare, the team was thrashed by Kenya and beat only Namibia and Holland. Now Streak, at 29, has to oversee the rebuilding of a side hit by four retirements of key players, starting with Flower and Olonga.

On the two-Test tour to England he leads a team whose vice-captain is a promising 19-year-old wicketkeeper, Tatenda Taibu. The only team members whose Test qualifications are not in doubt are Streak himself and Grant Flower. As a fast bowler of great strength and stamina, Streak has taken 180 wickets at 26.98 in 51 Tests and averaged 21.01 with the bat. At Lord's on May 22 he leads his side for the 14th time in Tests. But he is now considered less as a hero and more as an enigma in international cricket.

A big, physically imposing man with dark smouldering eyes, Streak belongs to the strong, silent school of leadership. He is ill at ease under interrogation by journalists and it is easy to see how he became a media bogeyman. "Never complain, never explain" would summarise his public relations technique. He obviously prefers the new ball to do his talking for him.

When we met in Bulawayo, his hometown, he was sitting at a cafe table nursing a cup of tea being unrepentant about his behaviour during the World Cup. "No one lives in an ideal world," he said. "We're in a world where there's terrorism and a war in the Middle East. At the end of the day sport is a job like any other, the players are just trying to make a living."

Flower used similar language to reach exactly the opposite conclusion when we spoke a couple of days later. "It's a bit of a cop-out to say `I can't get involved in politics because I'm a cricketer'. What about a businessman, what about a bricklayer? That argument is flawed. Only in an ideal world do sport and politics not mix."

But Streak's own daily life is inseparable from the consequences of politics. We had been talking for 10 minutes when a man approached our table with two small sacks. A conversation ensued in Ndebele, the local African language, which ended with Streak handing over money in exchange for the unlabelled sacks. "Sorry about that," he said. "It's so hard to get bread these days. I'm lucky to know people who can."

Heath Streak indulges in some bonding ahead of the Zimbabwe's tour opener at Edgbaston Getty Images

Streak insists he is not insensitive to the pain people are suffering but his public position is uncompromising. He believes that sportsmen stand above politics and have a separate responsibility for a higher national ethos. "I think, as far as we can, sports people must realise that we're ambassadors for our country and we've got to try and keep to sport as our topic," he said. In what appeared to be a gentle dig at Flower and Olonga he added: "I encouraged the team to do that so that they could try and focus and give themselves their best chance in the tournament."

But not many personalities are as simple as they look, and it would be a serious error to think that Streak is motivated by racism. He grew up in Matabeleland, in the south-west of the country, and feels a strong kinship to the area's Ndebele tribe who make up about a fifth of Zimbabwe's population and have suffered more than any other ethnic group during Mugabe's 23-year rule. I had watched Zimbabwe's opening Super Six game against New Zealand with the squad of Bulawayo's biggest football team, Highlanders, and was surprised to hear the esteem Streak is held in by Bulawayo's Africans. As Streak put on an exhibition of ferocious hitting, scoring 72 off 84 balls, one partisan spectator said: "Heath is a great man, a real Ndebele, he learnt Ndebele before he could speak English. You would never know he was white the way he speaks it."

When I told Streak he leaked a little passion. "I grew up in a farming area and used to play with Ndebele kids, so my first language as a youngster was Ndebele and I've spoken it ever since. I think it's a pity more Europeans here don't speak the language. We learn how to speak Afrikaans and French but I think it would be of greater benefit to speak African languages. You have a much greater understanding not only of what people are about but also their culture." He is a Matabele and a Bulawayo boy and proud of it.

His cultural sensitivities make his stubborn political position all the more perplexing. When the subject turns to the 40 democracy campaigners arrested at the Holland match, who were later locked up in a cell measuring 15 feet by eight with no functioning toilet, Streak is ambivalent. He described the incident as "disappointing" and then repeated his familiar mantra. "To use a sporting stage to make political statements is a little bit unfair on the sport and also on the people who go there for an enjoyable day and are impartial to what's going on." It is his denial of any political context which gives rise to the "Mugabe apologist" tag, however unfair.

Streak himself declares that the World Cup was a "fantastic" tournament that will accelerate the development of cricket in Africa. He regrets the cancelled game with England. "We were disappointed in a cricketing sense when England decided not to come," he said. "We've always had a good rivalry in the past here; we've beaten them and they've beaten us. But I do sympathise with Nasser Hussain who was already under a lot of pressure without this boycott issue."

Pressed on England's safety in Harare he sighs. "I always say `my crystal ball went in for a service so I can't really tell" - a sign perhaps that his certainty before the World Cup was dented slightly by the demonstrations that did take place, together with the knowledge that an England protest would have dwarfed the others. Indeed opposition supporters have said that weeks of detailed planning had gone into preparation for a "stunning" demonstration for the England match. They will not reveal the plan. "We might use it another time, so we're not telling anyone," said one of them.

If the past was lined with potential pitfalls, the future looks no less testing. With Flower and Olonga joined on the international retirement list by Guy Whittall and Alistair Campbell Zimbabwe look fragile. Unless young players, such as Tatenda Taibu, and the medium-fast bowler Andy Blignaut quickly establish themselves as replacements the English tour could become a rout. Streak, who made his debut against Pakistan 10 years ago, says Zimbabwe are in a "rebuilding phase".

Zimbabwe did restore some pride by defeating Kenya and Sri Lanka to reach the Sharjah Cup final in April and, playing as a national team against England, Zimbabwe can perform well above themselves, as they did in a well-fought, rain-spoiled draw at Trent Bridge in 2000 after losing by an innings and 209 runs at Lord's. (Streak took nine wickets at 20.22 in the series.) But the youngsters will have to step up fast if Zimbabwe's "rebuilding phase" is not to turn into a bereavement phase.