Discovering Cricket!

Cricket, before arriving in Australia I knew of Cricket, but had absolutely no idea on how the sport was played. I had seen it on a few occasions before, not a full game mind you, just a few minutes here and there while it was being shown on the TV at Pubs and in B&B’s all across Ireland (they were shown on a British TV channel of course).

Every time that I saw glimpses of it I tried to understand some part of it, but eventually got bored and resumed doing some other more interesting things….(like finding out what was on the bottom of my beer glass).

After I’d been in Australia for a few months though a series called “The Ashes” was being played over in England and there was pretty much nothing else on the TV, news or newspapers. A guy that I worked with at that time (a British bloke) was discussing it with us, but I still had no idea on what he was on about.

One night while sitting with Harry watching a game on the TV he started to explain the basic rules to me. Once I’d grasped them he continued to explain other parts of the game, even why it was called the Ashes and what it actually was all about.

Somehow I quickly started to get interested in the game and watched it more and more, everytime picking up something new.

Between the end of December and early January I was between jobs, had nothing to do and didn’t want to spend too much money. At the same time Australia was hosting South Africa and playing some Test matches against them. So I had plenty of time sitting in front of the TV to watch the games and learn more about it.

Eventually I just had to go and see a game, we decided to go see a One Day International (more action in them and the game only lasts a day) match between the nations, found ourselves some tickets and went to the Sydney Cricket Ground to watch the game.

It was great, I loved it….not only the game but the atmosphere as well! A One day match takes around 8 hours to play so there’s lots of time where the spectators just do other things to pass time, such as kicking and hitting an inflatable ball around (and sometimes even a blow up sex doll, hilarious) and building so called “beer snakes”, which happens when you stack all your beer cups together and form a long snake. It was also fun to watch the police when they carried out people that just couldn’t behave.

The first few hours we had to make sure we kept renewing our sunscreen but eventually the sun settled. Before that it’s sunnies, hats and lots sunscreen, specially since we were sitting in a section without a roof. And the game, well…Australia smashed South Africa in the match.

It was so much fun to see a game live that we got tickets for the next one as well, this time against Sri Lanka. A game that Australia ended up wining by many, many runs….

But it didn’t look like it when we arrived…we were a bit late walking towards the S.C.G. and we heard the crowd roar on our way over there, we thought that Australia must have scored lots of runs or something similar but discovered that before we even got to our seats, Australia had three of their batsmen out. Well…..they ended up wining anyway like I mentioned and this game turned out to be even better than the last (didn’t hurt that this time we were sitting under the shade either).

The best part of that day though was after the game. Even though Sri Lanka had been given a thorough stomping, their fans still danced, sang and celebrated as if their team had won the World Cup!

Lots of people outside of the main Cricket nations always gives you a weird look when you tell them that you love watching a game of Cricket and that a One Day International match lasts for up to 8 hours. But that’s nothing to the look of despair over their faces when you tell them that a Test match in Cricket last for up to 5 days, 8 hours a day of play….and can still end up in a draw!

What can I say? I’m hooked!