Kent v Warwickshire

Lemon Bella says:

Myself and Indian Skimmer saw three days of the Kent v Warwickshire match at the St Lawrence Ground. This report is late, because we spent the rest of the week going for walks and visiting the zoo.

I've also attached a photo of Simon Cook being conspicuously indifferent to cricket because cricketers are animals too.



On Saturday, we arrived ten minutes after Martin Van Jaarsveld scored his century, so we can't tell you anything about that. Also, we had to leave half an hour before Geraint Jones scored his century, so we can't tell you about that either. We're sure they were both very good. However, we can report that Andrew Hall is a lot smaller and rounder in real life than on the TV. We think he might have made himself smaller and rounder so he could fit in at Kent.

During the lunch break there was some sort of presentation. We have no idea what the presentation was for because the PA system was broken, making the announcer sound like a dalek. There was a lot of clapping, though, so we're sure the presentation must have been for something good.

Joe Denly ate a sandwich on the balcony. We were not close enough to see what kind of sandwich it was, even with binoculars. We had tuna mayonnaise sandwiches, so maybe he did too. We had coffee and walnut cake as well but Joe Denly doesn’t look like the type to eat cake. Andrew Hall does.

On Sunday we had some fantastic chocolate from Aldi. It didn't taste like you'd expect cheap chocolate from Aldi to taste. We did some internet research about the chocolate when we got home. The company that makes it was expelled from Germany in 1939, so it's actually anti-Nazi chocolate.

In the afternoon we went for a walk instead and found some cake in the members' lounge, but we weren't sure if we were supposed to eat it. We just used the coffee machine and snuck out before someone important demanded to see our members' pass and we had to try and find it. If anyone knows what the cake was for, and if we can eat it next time we see it, please let us know.

On Monday it rained a lot and we went to the pub. We bought some crisps and a man told us it was nice to see young ladies like us at the cricket.

England v India, third Test

You'll have noticed that we didn't do anything about the third Test yesterday. It's almost like we knew that Miriam was doing a match report for days four and five. But we didn't. We didn't know that at all. We're just lazy.

Miriam's match report:

Day four

(1) I live near the Oval and am acutely aware of the food situation so brought sandwiches from home, but was very envious of the M&S picnic of the men in front of us.

(2) I didn’t take a sweater, so was too cold for parts of the day. On the plus side, it didn’t matter that I’d forgotten sunscreen.

(3) When we got home, we watched the highlights. At one point there was a shot of RP Singh on the balcony with his bare feet on the railings and we both had the same thought: He has really, really beautiful feet, especially for a man. We wondered if he pedicures. He does obviously go to the hairdresser saying: “Just a trim, but I don’t want to lose any volume on top please”.

Day five

(1) The man next to us spilt a pint of beer - luckily not on us.

(2) We spent some time analysing the chants emanating from the noisy stand next to us. “Boring Boring England” is in itself boring, so shouldn’t be used, unless it is meant to be making an ironic point. “1 – 0 to the India” only encourages India to settle for a draw. “Barmy Army. Barmy Army” did not please us as we thought it was more for the supporters than the players. But we did like “Ian Bell, Bell, Bell, Ian Bell” (to the tune of “you can ring my bell”).

(3) We got cups of tea during the bad light break and they really hit the spot. The cups should be bigger though – the mark-up that could be charged on a larger cup of tea would surely vastly outweigh the extra cost of the cup and the negligible cost of the water.

(4) At one point all the Indian players were in a huddle except Sreesanth, who was miles away waiting in his field position. He noticed the huddle and went up to them, at which point the huddle instantly separated. I did wonder if they were all like: “Shhh, shhhh, he’s coming, quick, change the subject”.

(5) The following people gave the crowd a wave when asked: Sourav Ganguly, Sachin Tendulkar, Sreesanth, Steve Bucknor.

(6) When Zaheer Khan was announced as India’s Man of the Series, they put his name on the big screen. Only they spelt it wrong. If it were someone with an equivocal name (eg Karthick/Karthik) that’s one thing, but KHAN? It’s the easiest of the lot, people! I just hope they got it right on his cheque. Also, the variety of fonts they used on the big screen made it look like a personalised greetings card - "Congratulations ZAHEER KAHN on passing your driving test" or whatever.

A match report from ages ago with no picture

We were away when this was sent. It doesn't matter though. All of the match reports thus far have been timeless - this one included.

This is from Liz who has conspicuously omitted a Graham Onions joke towards the end.

Surrey v Durham, The Oval, Sunday 8th July

I am unable to comment on the play as I got there two hours late, left two hours early, and spent much of the interim reading the paper. I can report on the food though.

Poorly planned picnics at the Oval are limited in what foodstuffs can be included. We had imagined maybe some baguettes with grapes and stilton - ooh, maybe dolcelatte. We forgot of course that these levels of groceries are unavailable in the immediate environs of the Oval. You'd probably have to go to Kennington Tesco for that kind of thing.

The nearest 'Food and Wine' to the tube yielded vacuum-packed chorizo and jarlsberg though, slightly stale bread, some greasy kabano and spicy plantain chips, washed down with cans of John Smiths. Ideal.

Lots of small boys were getting the players to autograph their tiny souvenir cricket bats. One of our co-spectators wished she had brought some parmesan for Steve Harmison to sign - 'What a caesar salad that would be - Harmison Parmesan'. Phil Mustard probably gets fed up of people asking him to sign their Colemans.

The greatest shot ever played

Picture the scene: Several of us are playing cricket down the driveway of a semi-detached house. The stumps are on the garage door. From the batsman's point of view, the wall of the house runs along the on-side. Behind the bowler's arm, on the opposite side of the road, is a large tree. Behind that is another house.

J was batting...

The ball was quick and full. It spat off the irregular concrete, but J's eye was good. He launched a lofted straight drive.

Having travelled the length of the on-side building, the ball swerved as it crossed the road, passing the tree to the left from the batsman's point of view.

Now here's the really remarkable part. Having swerved one way to avoid the tree, it then swerved back again, behind the tree. The ball had now reached its zenith and began its descent.

Having wowed us with its bizarre powers of swing, the ball now revealed the level of its precision. It continued its journey through the open upstairs window of the house across the road.

There was a brief pause as we all drank in the magnitude of the achievement - a heartbeat perhaps - before the most alert of our number gathered his wits and cried 'scat!'.

And scat we did. For the devil in a red cardigan inhabited that house.

Surrey v Middlesex Twenty20 match report

The Scientician - he of Jaffa Cake fame - sent us a match report of the Twenty20 match between Surrey and Middlesex on Friday.

Here it is:

It was dark. It rained. The cricket didn't stop.

There were two Scooby Doos sat next to each other.



I'd like to think that either:

(a) Each didn't know that the other would be wearing a Scooby Doo costume, much like the plot of an American teen drama - how embarrassing, turing up to the prom/party/cricket in the same dress/top/Scooby Doo costume in order to impress Todd/Jason/Rampers.

Or (b) They, like most other people in the crowd, had come straight from work, but at their work they have to dress as Scooby Doo.

The queue for the bar was very long, but a man talked to us about the Middlewich Folk and Boat, so it was okay.

Beer prices were okay, considering this was London. Rubbish beer though: Marston's Smooth and Foster's.

There were lots of chinless wonders too.



The Jaffa Cake was my friend's idea. She thought it was hilarious. I'm yet to be convinced. I didn't bring the glove especially, I just happened to have it in my back pocket...

After we went to the pub and got really drunk. I got lost on the way home.

Sri Lanka v Bangladesh - day one match report

Miriam put this in the comments of the previous post. We're nothing if not lazy, so we're republishing the report in its entirety as a post in its own right. Thanks Miriam:

I watched this day of play on telly. Here is my match report (I know match reports are meant to be from live attendance, but it was a bit far to go given that I'm meant to be back at work tomorrow):

1) Michael Vandort has dyed his hair a reddish colour. As the day went on, the colour started to run onto his shirt collar. That shirt is now ruined - there's no way that's coming out in the wash.

2) There were lots of big crows / rooks / whatever they are called, on the field, being noisy, and being really quite indifferent to the cricket.

3) At one point the ball ended up lodged against Vandort's, erm, box.

4) Russell Arnold was commentating. He was quite good, I thought.

5) Jayawardene complained about Shahadat Hossain's grunt when he bowls.

6) Shakib Al Hasan top-scored for Bangladesh, but it was a very qualified success as his score was 16, out of a total of 89.

Worcestershire v Warwickshire match report

Bitter local rivals Worcestershire and Warwickshire clashed in the Friends Provident Trophy on Sunday. There was bound to be a bit of edge to proceedings.

Chris reports:

"The toffee ice-cream was particularly fine. A highlight was a fat Warwickshire man with an enormous voice. His encouraging rants boomed across the field for two hours or so. He then shouted "rubbish" and was not heard again as Worcestershire marched to 230-odd for none.

"The broomwork of the groundstaff on the wicket after the match was exquisite and there was also an impromptu quiz: "Which players have reached 40,000 first class runs?" asked a man with Wisden resting on his stomach."

Thanks Chris. This report is even more impressive for the fact that it arrived within half an hour of our request for match reports.

Tell us about the cricket

It's the Old Trafford Test today - the highlight of the Mancunian cricketing calendar. What kind of calendar have you got? One with badgers on? Not us. Ian "Fatty" Austin's July. We can't wait.

We'll be attending the Test on Saturday (day three), so if there's an update on Saturday evening, er, it's not us. It's, er... we'll have been hacked or something. Definitely not us though.

If you're attending a Test or indeed any form of cricket this summer, why not send us a report.

However, under no circumstances should you actually mention the cricket itself. If you concentrate on the incidental and the downright mundane, that'll make us very happy indeed.

The only exception is if you're playing a game with your mate down the drive and the stumps are chalked on the garage door. In that situation, or a similar one, we really do want to know how the match went.