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Giving
up every summer Saturday to play cricket is a big ask.
Not
just for you, but for your wife and kids. Or husband, girlfriend, boyfriend,
mum and dad: whoever it is you share your life with.
There
are myriad reasons to do it, untold ways in which cricket enriches our lives,
characters and friendships, many of which this column has touched on in the
past.
But
the most important thing is to enjoy it. If you don’t enjoy it, there really
isn’t much point.
And
it’s not just us on village greens. The visiting Kiwis have reminded everyone,
not least England, the importance of enjoying the game.
Brendon
McCullum, short of runs this tour by his own lofty standards, has not stopped
smiling. His charges, too, go about their business as if they’re actually enjoying
being well paid to travel the world playing cricket. Fancy.
When
McCullum got the captaincy two years ago, his countrymen regarded their
national cricket team as “overpaid, under-delivering prima donnas,” he says,
“and a lot of that was fair. One of the things we decided we had to change was
the public perception of us as people.”
Coach
Mike Hesson played his part, encouraging the team to “play like the kids who
fell in love with the game in the first place.”
It
shows.
Win
or lose, the fun they’re having is infectious, and the joy of it permeates
their cricket. They have reminded us all of the value of playing with a smile.
But
the game is not always joyful. Saturday was probably the least fun I’ve ever
had on a cricket field.
We
were generally sloppy in the field, but the worst of it was 10 dropped catches.
TEN! Two of us had hat-tricks of drops. I was one of them. They got easier too:
the first was difficult, the second regulation, the third so straightforward I
remain at a loss to explain how it ended up on the floor. It was gloomy and
drizzly; we were off twice for rain; the ball was an oval bar of soap; the
straight boundary was unprotectably short; we only had 10 men – we had plenty
of excuses. Bottom line: we were dreadful, we got thrashed.
It’s
difficult to enjoy a game like that.
Particularly
difficult, after that abject nonsense in the field, to remain chipper having
got out cheaply, then sat there watching all your teammates get out cheaply.
Difficult,
but important.
About
the only thing you can do when you’ve been that bad is shake the opposition by
the hand one by one, look them in the eye, smile, and tell them well played.
Then
go home, mope a little bit, but not too much. We owe it to our loved ones and
the sacrifices they make to put a brave face on this nightmare of ineptitude,
struggle through it, and turn up next week with full ear-to-ear grins ready to
pretend it never happened.
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ends 492 words -
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