The term “cricket tragic” is often heard in Australia. I consider myself to be more of a cricket melodramatic – basically a tragic, but with the occasional bout of euphoria thrown in. One such bout took place last week.
Ask my wife. Last month we celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary. The wedding took place on the weekend between the first and second test matches of the famous 2005 Ashes series. My “stag day” had been at Lord’s the previous Saturday, where we had watched what turned out to be the end of an era – Glenn McGrath decimating the England batting order without breaking a sweat. If the future Mrs Brennan – as a Czech, more attuned to the rhythms of ice hockey than a five-day test match – thought that our wedding weekend would be cricket-free as there was no test match on, she was sadly mistaken. We got married at a beautiful Chateau in the Loire Valley, where the male guests (of whom there were a suspicious 22) played a hotly contested 40-over match the following day (The Rest of the World beat Prague Past and Present by three runs). The following week, on our honeymoon, I left her alone at our lunch table over-looking Venice’s Grand Canal so I could check the score on the final day of that year’s amazing Edgbaston Test Match. I am not proud of this.
I arrived in Australia in 2012, with England holding the Ashes. This was not to last. The Australian team in 2013-14 meant business, and England’s tour went from bad to worse, culminating in the completion of a 5-0 drubbing on a Sydney Sunday afternoon. I was there. For any England fan, this was a bad day. For me, however, there was added ignominy. It was Jane McGrath Day, when the whole of the Sydney Cricket Ground crowd dresses in pink to commemorate the life of Jane McGrath and raise money and awareness for the breast cancer charity created by the afore-mentioned Glenn in her memory. I realised the night before that I had come to Sydney without anything pink to wear, and so went into a Bondi boutique to buy the first pink T-shirt I could find. Never a great shopper, I excelled on this occasion, as I discovered when I unwrapped the T-shirt the next morning. So, throughout England’s miserable, 31.4-over second innings, I was wearing a powder pink girl’s T-shirt with a picture of Sydney Harbour Bridge drawn in rhinestones on the front. Than this it does not get worse.
So this year’s Ashes came as a pleasant change. Not that I have made a helpful contribution. I arranged my summer/winter holiday to enable me to go to the Lord’s Test (my wife’s rumbled me by now – she went to Prague instead). So I sat at the home of cricket for four days watching the England team being minced. I watched the comeback match in Edgbaston on telly; this was better for England, but as a long-time follower of that team I know it’s not the pain that gets you, it’s the hope. So all eyes turned to Trent Bridge. Except mine; I had somehow managed to book a flight back to Australia coinciding with the first day of the Nottingham Test. “Not to worry,” I thought, “The first day at Trent Bridge is normally fairly quiet”. I managed to get an internet connection during the flight, and would like to apologise to the neighbouring passengers for the involuntary whoop I emitted on seeing the score at 21-5. I watched the third and final day at home in Canberra; fortunately it finished early enough that I could give the remote to the long-suffering Mrs Brennan, and we ended the evening watching Poirot.
So I am currently a cricket melodramatic going through an up-swing. But I am keeping it to myself. Whilst I wouldn’t mind catching up with some of the people who were wearing disobliging T-shirts about Stuart Broad in 2014, to find out how their day is going, my Australian friends and colleagues have been charming and congratulatory about how this series has gone – as I hope I managed to be last time, and will be next time that the Urn finds itself in Australian hands. If following cricket for as long as I have teaches you anything, it’s that what goes around comes around. Although Australia have won significantly more matches than England, the record, after 133 years of competition, is that both countries have won 32 series. So the bragging rights are currently with England, but they will be back with Australia one day – but hopefully not too soon. Whoever holds the Urn at a given time, the friendship between our countries will continue to be as unique as is the sporting rivalry between us.
60 all out, though. Blimey.