Things I have learnt about cricket
Until today, my knowledge of cricket had almost completely come from the 18 month period in which I lived with Daz and Andy. We shared a house near Platt Fields and we had Sky Sports. I couldn’t tell you if we had any other channels. They may’ve been there, but I never saw them.
Daz and Andy taught me the following things about cricket:
‘20 20’ is okay if there’s nothing else on but it doesn’t really count.
All cricket matches involve a lengthy period in which spectators must debate the relative merits of Lancashire and Yorkshire. The normal rules of polite conversation do not apply to this period and it’s generally understood that the loser has to do the washing up.
At the end of the cricket the winning team gets to borrow an egg cup until the next match.
Andy catches “like a girl”.
This basic level of understanding has sufficed for several years now, but today I saw The Ashes at Nottingham Playhouse, and it turns out there’s LOADS more to it than that. I tried to tell the old guy to my left that “Yorkshiremen are all cunts” but I don’t think he was familiar with the Daz and Andy cricket rules.
Basically, in the winter of 1932/3, England went to Australia to try to win the egg cup. They (SPOILER ALERT) succeeded, but only because this one guy who used to be a coal-miner bowled like a cannon right at the Aussies. The cricketing world was up-in-arms because it was ‘unsportsmanlike’ but, the way I see it, it was just like in Gladiators when Shadow would do that freaky eye thing at the contender in Duel. Psychological warfare. So that’s something else I’ve learnt about cricket today: they don’t really go in for psychological warfare.
The Ashes is a straight play in many ways. It’s a great story with a nice narrative arc and a bit of gentle emotion (when the rest of the team isn’t watching), but it’s also staged very simply so the cast can use their voices to full effect, and no-one in the audience has to field.
I should really seek out a play about tennis now, to clear up some of the issues I have with their scoring system.
