The Beauty Of Cricket

The sun shone down on the perfect green grass. The little white gate in front of the pavilion swung open and the cricketers of England and the West Indies stepped out onto Lord's Cricket Ground....white clouds drifted aimlessly across the blue sky....the powerfully-built Higgs from Lancashire came bustling in to the wicket....the ball reared up in front of the West Indian batsman....it leapt up off of his bat....young Jim Caldicott, playing his first game for England, ran in purposefully and reached out to take the catch....

"CALDICOTT!" the voice of Mr Matravers echoed around the classroom, "Wake up, boy, and answer the question!" It was Mr Matravers; it must be History. Answer the question...answer the question...he looked up at the ruddy face of the dreadful Mr Matravers..."Errr, 1066, Sir?"

"We are studying, are we not, Caldicott, the reign of Henry VIII and, in particular, his unhappy wives. A diverse and largely unfortunate group of ladies, Caldicott. But none, so far as the annals of history inform us, unfortunate enough to be named 1066! Stand up boy!"

He fumbled and struggled to stand, his jacket sleeve seeming to be somehow caught on the desk lid. "Come here, boy!"  Caldicott shook his arm,  a wire of some kind appeared to be tethering him to his desk. Another step and voices issued from within the desk, the cricket commentary coming from the Test Match at Lord's.

"Aha! Ingenious, Mr Caldicott! A radio in the desk, connected to an earpiece; the wire to the earpiece cunningly passing down your sleeve to the hand which supports your big, fat head! Now take the wretched gadget to the Octagon."

Jim Caldicott knew what that meant. Everybody in the school knew what that meant. The Octagon was outside the Headmaster's Study, and there you had to stand and fret until the Head spotted you and dragged you in to face the consequences of your crimes. There was always a chance that the Head was busy and told you to go back to class, but that had never happened to Jim.

He clutched the radio to his chest and waited for the Head's door to open. Suddenly he felt a hand on his shoulder as the Headmaster appeared from behind him. "Hello, hello, it's Caldicott. I've been wanting to see you, lad, we need to have a serious word, if you get my meaning, a very serious word." Everyone knew that Old Beaky, as Mr Eagleton was known by the boys, was a lot smarter than his bumbling manner suggested, but how on earth did he already know about this latest misdemeanor ?

"Sit down, lad. No, stand up. Standing up suits my purpose better, if you get my drift". He reached for the cane and flexed it. "Now, young fellow, I was watching you on Tuesday and I didn't like what I saw"..... Tuesday?..... "You were playing cricket, is that not so? House match, wasn't it?" Jim couldn't help a slight smile; he'd made 30 not out and had won the game for his team. "This is no smiling matter, lad"  said the headmaster as he took the cane in both hands.

"Now, you were getting your foot to the pitch of the ball all right", he said demonstrating the shot with the cane for a bat, "But your leg was straight as a ramrod and that simply won't do, won't do at all! Bend at the knee and the ball goes along the deck, but keep the leg straight, like you do, and the ball goes up in the rigging, so as to speak, to continue the metaphor, if you like."

"Yes, Sir"

"Yessir, indeed. You got away with it Tuesday afternoon on account of Johnson fielding at mid-off. As a cricketer he's very good at his Latin verbs, if you'll pardon my indiscretion in saying so. But if you play like that on Saturday against King's School it'll be how's that and thankyouverymuch! They'll catch it, won't they"

"I suppose so, Sir."

"Very good cricketers, King's. Should be too with their full-time cricket coach. They'll catch it all right. Rich boys, you see, very good at reaching up and grabbing anything that comes their way. Not so keen on having to bend their backs and grovel about on the ground though, eh? Now show me how you'll do it" and he handed the cane to Jim who put down the radio and demonstrated the shot.

"Splendid, splendid! Now what's that you've just put on the table," said Mr Eagleton, noticing the radio for the first time,"A wireless?" Jim confessed the whole tale.

"Grave, very grave. We simply can't allow this sort of thing. Hand it to me. I'll retain it in my possession and you can have it back tonight when you go home. Only on condition, you understand. On condition that a) You'll not bring it to school ever again,  b) You'll certainly not listen to it in lessons and c) You must never get caught listening to it by Mr Matravers." 

The Headmaster smiled while Jim tried to work out the exact meaning of these conditions. And failed.

"Works on batteries, I suppose.... Mmm....and turns on here, no doubt...." The Headmaster stood stroking his chin while the radio crackled into life. Mr Eagleton and Jim Caldicott stood side by side waiting for the score to be given.

"West Indies 130 for 3", mused the Headmaster, "That's the beauty of cricket, isn't it?"

"Sir?"

"Well, a couple of wickets for us and it's all plain sailing. But a quick 100 or so from them and they'll be in the ascendency. That's the beauty of cricket, you see, James, you never quite know which way it'll go".

********

Take care 

      

A Funny Old Game

Something is going on down on the village green. Something very strange. Something very English. Over the lifetime of this blog I've described, illustrated, celebrated and tried to explain many aspects of life here on this little island. But I can't explain what's happening on the village green today; it's just too involved, too complicated and too mysterious. It's called village cricket.
Old-style village cricket.

When it comes to village greens, the village of Barrington has a very fine one indeed. In the 1960s they had a very fine cricket team too. They are not so successful these days but they play the game in the traditional way. The top village sides these days concentrate on fitness, motivation, visualisation, intensity and energy. It wins matches but it has no charm and very little humour. That's not to say that people weren't trying to win in the past; they just did it with a smile.

Barrington Cricket Club was founded back in 1889 and have been playing on the green ever since - no, not the same match, or even the same players! In fact matches have been played here since at least 1843 and before the First World War matches were played between local farmers and teams of well-known players including Jack Hobbs and Tom Hayward.

When I got interested in the game, through childhood knock-abouts in the garden on the rough strip of grass which we optimistically called "the lawn", my father took me to watch the village team who played on an old meadow next to the brook. The team was composed of men from the village - farm workers, the butcher, the local builder, a gardener....they became heroes for the day through their exploits on the cricket field.

Old timers passed their experience and knowledge on to the youngsters, along with some fanciful tales of their exploits "when I were a fit young fellow like you". Sometimes we even got a game when harvest work meant that many of the regulars weren't available.

Next man in....will he get a bat....will he be any good....

....plenty of brute force usually gets the job done! Meanwhile experts look on...

....the young....

....and not so young.

 It's a game that embodies the personality of men from the country; it requires strength, bravery, subtle cunning and well-honed skills. But mostly it requires endless patience; there's a lot of waiting in cricket - it's a ritual and an art as much as a sport.   

This is how the game was once explained:

• There are two sides, one out in the field and the other in.
• Each man that's in the side that's in goes out, and when he's out he comes in and the next man goes in until he's out.
• When they are all out, the side that's out comes in and the side that's been in goes out and tries to get those coming in, out.
• Sometimes you get men still in and not out.
• When a man comes out to go in, the men who are out try to get him out, and when he is out he goes in and the next man comes out to go in.
• There are two men called umpires who stay out all the time and they decide when the men who are in are out.
• When both sides have been in and all the men are out, and both sides have been out twice after all the men have been in, including the not outs, then that's the end of the game.

So that's sorted that out then!

Take care.

Seasonal Obsessions

An Englishman's summer obsessions are these:

1. watching the weather
2. watching the cricket
3. watching out for summer migrant birds

Well, those are my obsessions anyway.

Firstly, the weather. It's actually been raining this afternoon as is evidenced by the above picture. It hasn't rained properly in my part of the world for the last two months and everything, especially in my garden, is looking rather thirsty. The ground is looking like this:

Now I know that's no big deal if you're reading this in Adelaide or Texas but this is England in May.

Then there's Cricket, that strange pastime which usually causes the heavens to open. England have just recorded a remarkable victory, but that's not what I've ben thinking about. I've been thinking about village cricket, which bears as much relation to international cricket as a barn dance to the Bolshoi ballet.

I was watching a match on Parker's Piece in the centre of Cambridge. They'd obviously been watching a lot of first class matches on TV and were "trying to do things proper, like". At least, they all had white trousers and walked around clapping their hands like real cricketers. All rather different from the first game I ever saw on a cow pasture in Caldecote. Some of the men wore their work boots and the ball had to be frequently retrieved from the brook, having been deposited there by a red-faced farmer who may have lacked timing and technique but made up for it with brute strength. Or at Grantchester where the opening bowler had to be summoned from a lunchtime drinking session in the pub.

All that remains of Grantchester's team is the old pavilion, now used as an artist's studio, and the roller which was used to prepare the pitch.

And finally. Turtle Doves are in decline and you can spend a lot of time searching for them. Even if you can hear their gentle purring song it can still be difficult to catch sight of one. Or you can come home as I did this afternoon and see one walking about on the grass just outside the window. Thanks once again to my neighbour and his feeding station. I just hope he saw it too.

Take care.