A few hundred yards from where the scimitar sails of Arab dhows carved their way across an iridescent sea, sporting history was being made on a dusty patch of scrubland. Out in the midday sun, a band of madly dogged Englishmen were bringing cricket back to the spice island of Zanzibar – complete with cucumber sandwiches for tea.

A restless, hunchbacked bullock strolled behind the bowler’s arm. Statuesque women in red and green robes catwalked around the boundary carrying mounds of bananas, jerry cans of water or piles of driftwood on their heads with serenity. Mothers and infants squatted beneath the fronds of a banana tree. And the menfolk of the village stood and stared at these whiter-than-white men in their crisply laundered shirts and flannels.

From a single loudspeaker lashed to a pole, the local disc jockey tried to explain the rules of the game in Swahili: “Cricket is like football in that there are 11 players who all have their own positions. But footballers kick and hurt each other while cricketers are friendly and ask ‘How is that?’ when they think they have won.” What he could not explain was why the umpire stood on one leg before a single ball was bowled. (This was actually introduced by the legendary Test-match umpire David Shepherd whenever the score stood at 111.)

All this was to commemorate the 111th anniversary of the cricket match that started a war. In 1896, the Royal Navy squadron in the Indian Ocean learnt that there was to be a cricket match in the British protectorate of Zanzibar, and decided to go and watch it. But the arrival of the British fleet provoked panic in the new sultan, who had seized power illegally only the day before. He ordered his warship to attack, and the British promptly blew it out of the water and reduced his palace to rubble, killing and wounding 500 of his followers.

First shots were fired at 9.02am. The sultan was fleeing to exile in German East Africa by 9.40am – earning the encounter the record of being the shortest war in history. In the bloody aftermath there was no record of the match taking place, but cricket went on to flourish in Zanzibar over the following 67 years of British rule. However, this came to an end in January 1964, when the communists took power, nationalised all land and banished cricket as an elitist western ritual. And so the click of leather on willow seemed destined never to be heard again. Until last autumn, when the intrepid Old Bedfordians Touring Party – named after their favourite London pub – set out on their latest mission to take cricket into the unknown. They have clocked up 120,000 miles, from Argentina to Bali, Tuscany to Goa. Cuba was, alas, the only win the gallant tourists had recorded in all of their global travels.

The team includes an art consultant, a publisher, a deputy director of children’s services, a company director, a print sales manager, an accountant, a retired solicitor and a former advertising executive. The Old Bedfordians chose to start their latest tour in the village of Nungwi, on the northern tip of Zanzibar, after learning that the sportsmaster of the Islamic boys’ school was prepared to introduce cricket into the curriculum.

First call was to conduct elementary coaching for youngsters who had never seen a cricket bat before. Meanwhile, their master, Abdulle Abbas Wadi, was crouched over a Googled print-out of the rules of cricket and trying to translate into Swahili terms such as “leg before wicket” (mguu mbele ya vijiti) and “silly mid-off” (kusimama kwa ujinga – literally meaning “to stand foolishly”).

The big match took place the next day. An opposing team had been assembled of young Indian businessmen and white-collar workers from the capital, 30 miles south. They appeared athletically confident in immaculate whites, with their shirts carrying the logo “Zanzibar All Stars”.

The fact that one of their opening batsmen was clean-bowled second ball might have led the Old Bedfordians to believe that their second victory was within reach. That hope was to vanish as succeeding batsmen revealed elegant forward strokes, cracking cover drives and soaring hooks to the boundary – racing to 113 for 7 in 20 overs, whereas their hostile bowling had limited the distinctly bemused Old Bedfordians to 76 – 7.

After the defeat, over cucumber sandwiches, the Zanzibar All Stars revealed that they had been practising every day for six weeks, coached by a surviving veteran of one of the 1950s teams. Moreover, their captain believed the increasingly liberal yet still self-styled Revolutionary government of Zanzibar was now in favour of reviving cricket on the island. This was confirmed by Mansoor Yussuf Himid, a bold attacking batsman and accurate bowler. Why was he so confident about the government’s change of attitude?

“Because,” he said, “I am a member of the cabinet!” And who was going to provide playing fields with properly laid wickets?

“That will be no problem,” he said. “I am the Minister for Land.” All of which led the Old Bedfordians chairman, Mike Roberts, to proclaim the tour a triumph.

How to get there

Peter Jackson stayed at Flame Tree Cottages in the village of Nungwi, Zanzibar (from £1,135 per person for 10 days, including flights with BA). Arrangements were made by Zanzibar Travel (01242 222 027)

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