Prosper Utseya

Prosper Utseya

By Lovemore Dube  30/11/2022

BORN in Harare on 26 March 1985 and making his debut for Mashonaland A cricket side, Prosper Utseya represented the hope for Zimbabwe Cricket when a whole team of Whites snubbed national duty.

Following a standoff between Zimbabwe Cricket and senior players in 2004, selectors looked to rising stars like Utseya to fill in the void.

Heath Streak, Grant Flower, Andy Blignaut, Tatenda Taibu and Henry Olonga were among the big name stars to quit the game. This left Zimbabwe with a few experienced players to carry on playing cricket at the highest level and threw a lifeline to youngsters who had come through development structures mainly in Bulawayo, Harare and Manicaland.

Utseya who went to Churchill High School and had a great start in senior cricket when he made his debut for Mashonaland A, scoring a 50 in the Logan Cup against Manicaland, was quick to be promoted to the Under-19 national team and Zimbabwe A.

He was an impressive right handed bowler. Sensing he could be dwarfed by the big boys in Harare, who were more established, in 2004 ZC moved the 19-year-old to Manicaland where he earned a berth in the CFX Academy, an institution that sharpened many promising talents.

His first impressive bowling result was a first-class five-wicket haul with figure of 5/32 against Manicaland in October 2004.

His right-hand spin-bowling partnership with Timycen Maruma resulted in a series of domestic titles, and in 2008-09 his 10-wicket mark helped Eastern clinch a hard one-wicket victory over Northerns at Alexandra Sports Club in Harare.

The 10 wickets secured the Logan Cup for his team, Manicaland.

Utseya was hot property in the 2009-2010 season as his franchise, Mountaineers dominated the first-class scene in the domestic league.

He would be the first one to admit he owed his place in the national team to the senior player’s standoff with the national association, but with time he proved his worth, with some great performances with both the ball and the bat.

Utseya replaced Terry Duffin as captain of the senior national team in 2006 a position he held until 2010.

He had a great tour of the West Indies in May 2006 where he restricted the flow of runs for a team that relied more on legendary Brian Lara whom he beat with two successive deliveries in Trinidad and his much talked about dive, catch and juggle in the boundary of the oval on the second Test.

For a while, Utseya was said to be the first and joint world record holder for conceding the least runs, which was six in a T20 International after bowling the complete four of overs.

After a disappointing World Cup in 2010 Utseya did a rare thing among Zimbabwean sportspersons, which is stepping down.

At that stage he had led Zimbabwe in 67 one-day internationals, with 20 victories, and all 10 of the Twenty20 internationals the team had been engaged in.

It is worth mentioning his hat trick of wickets against South Africa at Harare Sports Club and became the second Zimbo to do so when he sent three South African batsmen Quinton de Kock, Rilee Rossouw and David Miller in consecutive deliveries in the third One-Day International match of the Tri-series in August 2014. 5/36 was his career best as a bowler.

In August 2014, Utseya reported for a suspect bowling action following the third ODI against South Africa in Bulawayo. Utseya was the fourth off spinner to have been reported for a suspect action over the last few months; the others were Sachithra Senanayake, Kane Williamson, and Saeed Ajmal.

At one time Utseya was ranked 15th in the ICC ODI Bowling Rankings with an economic bowling average of 3.84 which set him favourable among Muttiah Muralitharan and Harbhajan Singh of India some of the worlds greatest.

In 2015 Utseya retired after a fall out with Alistair Campbell who had been brought as cricket director whom he accused of bringing on White coaches to leave him out of the team.

Before his retirement, the former Chipembere Primary Schoolboy who rose to what some termed a mystery spinner, he was suspended for suspect bowling action by International Cricket Council and remedial work never achieved the desired clean bowling from him.