The epitome of a trailblazer in cricket writing, Firdose Moonda is celebrating 15 years at ESPN Cricinfo, having cemented herself as one of the most credible among respected writers in the industry.
The storied start to her cricket-writing career began at school when she became a scorer, before deeper learnings were acquired through tertiary education at Wits University, where Moonda studied a degree in Law, Economics, and International Relations on a scholarship from the Carnegie Foundation.
She explains how her sports media career with Cricinfo began.
“I worked as the internet scorer at the Wanderers – that was when Cricinfo would pay the cricket union to have a scorer at the ground to do internet scoring and type ball-by-ball commentary. So I did ball-by-ball commentary throughout my undergrad degree, and from there, I got a job working as a production assistant at the SABC in 2007, just after the T20 World Cup.”
“The following year I did my honours degree in journalism, where I got a job at the eNews channel, and that’s how it began!”
“I was quite personally associated with Cricinfo through the time that I was scoring, so I knew about the company, and I knew about the people there,” recalls Moonda. “I travelled to India in 2007, where I spent a few months getting to see the country and meet the people in the office, so my association with them goes back to that point. I probably started with internet scoring in 2005, so next year will be 20 years.”
If she’d had her way, Moonda might not have become a cricket writer at all.
“Yes, I definitely wanted to be a writer, but I didn’t always want to be a sports writer!“
“I wanted to be a political writer, I was interested in war correspondence, I wanted to write for TIME Magazine, and I wanted to write fiction. So being a writer was something I always wanted to do, not necessarily a sports writer.”
Moonda with Valkerie Baynes, Kalyani Mangale (New Indian Express), Lavanya Lakshminarayanan (The Hindu), and Purnima Malhotra (Cricbuzz) in Dubai.
Having been part of the cricket world for almost 20 decades, and having written about some of the biggest cricket matches, Moonda mentions a few that rank among her biggest career highlights.
“I have covered a lot of World Cups, the 2015 World Cup was something I enjoyed. I was covering Zimbabwe’s Test comeback in 2011, which was wonderful. Covering South Africa’s win of Test Mace in 2012 and the Women reaching back-to-back T20 World Cups was amazing.”
Moonda holds dear having been part of Cricket South Africa’s historic Social Justice and Nation Building Project in 2021.
“Covering the SJN was very important for me as a person of colour in a country where cricket is a sport of empire and racism. Getting to blend my social activism with my reporting was important. I have written. I have also written a lot of long-form features over the last four years, so that has been important too.”
With the experience Moonda has gathered over her career, she is able to share some real wisdom when It comes to what the media landscape was and how it has evolved over the years.
“The media changes, when I started I just used to write stories and pretty soon was doing video and then audio and then podcasts and then presenting a studio show. I guess just to stay flexible and adaptable.”
“Of course, one of the other lessons I have learned is that the players come and go, and the administrations come and go, but we stay on the job, so be consistent! They are people just like the rest of us, there is nothing less or more special about them.”
The cricket scribe was fortunate enough to have one of the most recognisable voices of the game as her mentor. Moonda explains how the late great broadcaster Tony Cozier had an impact on her career.
Baynes and Moonda with Nikita Bastian, Cricinfo Assistant Editor and the woman who makes sure the website runs.
“Tony Cozier was my first real mentor I guess, I met him on the 2007 tour, he worked for his father’s newspaper and he gave me a lot of interesting lessons about how to get into writing he always supported my career especially as it developed,” recalls Moonda.
“And then a guy called David Hopps was a really important influence on my writing. He taught me that we live in a world where the news must go out fast, so do it fast! Then you can spend your real time on more in-depth stuff, but that will be 20% of the stuff you do, so he helped me with my speed (in getting stories out).”
She says she has seen a marked increase in women covering women’s cricket as well as a big increase in diversity when it comes to who is covering cricket in South Africa, which is a significant change from how things were in yesteryear.
“I don’t see that many more women in the coverage of men’s sport but the most women I have seen is covering stuff, like at the Women’s World Cup but it’s great to see that things are changing.”
“What I am also happy to see is the environment is becoming a lot more diverse, especially in South Africa. When I first started it was pretty much a white, male-dominated industry, now there are so many journalists of colour but that is only really the case in South Africa but in other places like the UK and Australia, it’s not that diverse.”
Moonda also mentioned how important it is as a sports journalist to realise what a privileged position we are in when it comes to our careers.
“A lot of the advice I have got has been to work through it and learn on the job. We work in sports and tell stories of hope and opportunity, and what we are doing isn’t life or death per se’. There are many more important and big-picture things happening in the world. I think we have to keep that in perspective, and enjoy what we do and realise what a privilege it is in order to be able to do that!”
She admitted that opportunities in sports media are few and far between and there needs to be a change as sports journalism plays a huge role in news media.
“I think that opportunities in sports media are shrinking, everywhere. I think more opportunities need to be created in sports media in general because currently what we are seeing is that sports media is getting smaller and smaller.”
“What we need is for people to realise that there still needs to be a level of an outside voice and some critical thought. A lot of sports media has moved in-house, it’s the case of having that outside objective voice from the outside, reporting on sport is so important.”
She ended with this parting advice for aspiring writers … “You got to understand that you are not part of the team, you are not part of the administration, [you are an] outside voice. You are the person operating between the fans and the players, so you got to maintain integrity in that.”
Main Photo Caption: Firdose Moonda (left) is pictured with with ESPNcricinfo colleague and Powerplay podcast co-host, Valkerie Baynes, and Cricket Australia’s Laura Jolly, in Sharjah at the 2024 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup. The trailblazing cricket scribe is celebrating 15 years at ESPN Cricinfo. All Photos: Supplied
Photo 2 Caption: Moonda (2nd left) with Valkerie Baynes, Kalyani Mangale (New Indian Express), Lavanya Lakshminarayanan (The Hindu), and Purnima Malhotra (Cricbuzz) in Dubai.
Photo 3 Caption: Baynes and Moonda with Nikita Bastian, Cricinfo Assistant Editor and the woman who makes sure the website runs.
Photo 4 Caption: Moonda with ESPNcricinfo colleague and Powerplay podcast co-host, Valkerie Baynes, and Cricket Australia’s Laura Jolly, in Sharjah at the 2024 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup.
Celebrating Firdose Moonda’s Career at Cricinfo
The epitome of a trailblazer in cricket writing, Firdose Moonda is celebrating 15 years at ESPN Cricinfo, having cemented herself as one of the most credible among respected writers in the industry.
The storied start to her cricket-writing career began at school when she became a scorer, before deeper learnings were acquired through tertiary education at Wits University, where Moonda studied a degree in Law, Economics, and International Relations on a scholarship from the Carnegie Foundation.
She explains how her sports media career with Cricinfo began.
“I worked as the internet scorer at the Wanderers – that was when Cricinfo would pay the cricket union to have a scorer at the ground to do internet scoring and type ball-by-ball commentary. So I did ball-by-ball commentary throughout my undergrad degree, and from there, I got a job working as a production assistant at the SABC in 2007, just after the T20 World Cup.”
“I was quite personally associated with Cricinfo through the time that I was scoring, so I knew about the company, and I knew about the people there,” recalls Moonda. “I travelled to India in 2007, where I spent a few months getting to see the country and meet the people in the office, so my association with them goes back to that point. I probably started with internet scoring in 2005, so next year will be 20 years.”
If she’d had her way, Moonda might not have become a cricket writer at all.
“I wanted to be a political writer, I was interested in war correspondence, I wanted to write for TIME Magazine, and I wanted to write fiction. So being a writer was something I always wanted to do, not necessarily a sports writer.”
Having been part of the cricket world for almost 20 decades, and having written about some of the biggest cricket matches, Moonda mentions a few that rank among her biggest career highlights.
Moonda holds dear having been part of Cricket South Africa’s historic Social Justice and Nation Building Project in 2021.
With the experience Moonda has gathered over her career, she is able to share some real wisdom when It comes to what the media landscape was and how it has evolved over the years.
“The media changes, when I started I just used to write stories and pretty soon was doing video and then audio and then podcasts and then presenting a studio show. I guess just to stay flexible and adaptable.”
The cricket scribe was fortunate enough to have one of the most recognisable voices of the game as her mentor. Moonda explains how the late great broadcaster Tony Cozier had an impact on her career.
“Tony Cozier was my first real mentor I guess, I met him on the 2007 tour, he worked for his father’s newspaper and he gave me a lot of interesting lessons about how to get into writing he always supported my career especially as it developed,” recalls Moonda.
She says she has seen a marked increase in women covering women’s cricket as well as a big increase in diversity when it comes to who is covering cricket in South Africa, which is a significant change from how things were in yesteryear.
“I don’t see that many more women in the coverage of men’s sport but the most women I have seen is covering stuff, like at the Women’s World Cup but it’s great to see that things are changing.”
Moonda also mentioned how important it is as a sports journalist to realise what a privileged position we are in when it comes to our careers.
“A lot of the advice I have got has been to work through it and learn on the job. We work in sports and tell stories of hope and opportunity, and what we are doing isn’t life or death per se’. There are many more important and big-picture things happening in the world. I think we have to keep that in perspective, and enjoy what we do and realise what a privilege it is in order to be able to do that!”
She admitted that opportunities in sports media are few and far between and there needs to be a change as sports journalism plays a huge role in news media.
“What we need is for people to realise that there still needs to be a level of an outside voice and some critical thought. A lot of sports media has moved in-house, it’s the case of having that outside objective voice from the outside, reporting on sport is so important.”
She ended with this parting advice for aspiring writers … “You got to understand that you are not part of the team, you are not part of the administration, [you are an] outside voice. You are the person operating between the fans and the players, so you got to maintain integrity in that.”
Main Photo Caption: Firdose Moonda (left) is pictured with with ESPNcricinfo colleague and Powerplay podcast co-host, Valkerie Baynes, and Cricket Australia’s Laura Jolly, in Sharjah at the 2024 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup. The trailblazing cricket scribe is celebrating 15 years at ESPN Cricinfo. All Photos: Supplied
Photo 2 Caption: Moonda (2nd left) with Valkerie Baynes, Kalyani Mangale (New Indian Express), Lavanya Lakshminarayanan (The Hindu), and Purnima Malhotra (Cricbuzz) in Dubai.
Photo 3 Caption: Baynes and Moonda with Nikita Bastian, Cricinfo Assistant Editor and the woman who makes sure the website runs.
Photo 4 Caption: Moonda with ESPNcricinfo colleague and Powerplay podcast co-host, Valkerie Baynes, and Cricket Australia’s Laura Jolly, in Sharjah at the 2024 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup.
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