To the sounds of our theme song, Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire", history was made today.
When we are old, and grey and full of sleep we will tell of the day when we bestrode the world cricketing stage like a colossus; when Indian channel 20 played our highlights with reverence and little reference to the scores.
We have made an impression on this tournament as the team who are - in the words of one commentator - "unafraid to lose". We are in fact so unafraid at losing that we have lost every match.
Shot of the Day:An Englishman became the first man to hit a ball out of the Rajiv Gandhi Test Ground: no mean feat; mind you, as Jamie Cameron's along-the-ground shot had to beat square legs dive, go down the main the exit, dodge the rabid dogs, and bounce along a cart path into the car park to do so...
Generosity: We are not most generous hosts - the Indians have been great - but none more so than their hospitable first slip today who dropped 3 catches [including Q's first ball]. His captain promptly moved him only for him to drop another at cover ... His teammates were heard asking him if he was not from Lucknow but from Leicester.
Innings of the tournament: Q - the skip - hit 66 not out in a valiant leading from the front displayed of controlled hitting ... This would have been better if he had not discovered after only 2 shots with his "new" and "oh such a good deal" triple-decker bat that he had cracked it. We feel that the bargain was a little too good to be true.
Wickets: as usual our only catch wins catch of the day ... would that there were more but we only took two wickets. This second wicket being due reward for a great spell from Ian MacDougal [now known as the Doooougmeister/ Dougie Donnelly / The Doooug /or just plain Dougal from from Magic Roundabout].
The catch was one touched by the hand of God - or if not God then a showman or show off of epic proportions ... Diving [as usual in our team "like a leaping salmon" - more in hope than expectation] at short cover Guy Opperman clung to the small red ball with a viguor that most of us have only displayed when grasping the toilet seat as we undergo our own particular Indian ring of fire.
But frankly this was not what the crowd came to see. Having caught the ball our shy retiring all rounder was off on a near circuit of the ground. What followed was unquestionably the celebration of the tournament as he dived over the two giant turds left by the ever present pack of marauding rabid dogs [escaping from their lair in the directors' box] in the traditional Harbajhan Singh/Lord Percy style, and let loose the now traditional acceptance of the "Party Invitation" whilst pulling his trademark Henman punch.
Phrase of the Day: this was Q, who got a bit overexcited by the Indian batsman playing and missing outside off stump. We all agreed he was wafting at the ball and Q in excitement said "Come on lads, watch out for the wasp"; being charitable - this was the first time on tour we had no idea what he was talking about.
Sadly several members of the team - loyal lemmings that we are - and despite the fact that our skipper was talking gibberish - also started shouting: "look out for the wasp!". What made it worse was when the Indian batsman stopped taking guard and said "Is there a wasp?"
Several of us have been affected by the heat: none more so than James Cartwright, who in our warm-up today suddenly descended into the mysteries of the Orient. He launched a tirade against the Japanese, which culminated - all this during our stretching session - in him explaining how good he was at karate, how many heads the Japs liked to cut off and finished with him telling us how good they were at "yogi", which he assured us was not a cartoon character.
Grown men celebrated another thrashing by touring the stadium singing the Great Escape, the Dambusters and other classics theme tunes much to the amusement of our hosts
HIGHLIGHTS:
When Dave SuperHarmy came on to bowl we had 2 slips[for the first time this week] and a leg slip. This leg slip was a brave move, as he has an interetsing approach to line and length. On occasions he has been known to aim for leg slip. Placed there was our fearless Shropshire Lad Deni Matthews - he who had previously announced he was batting so badly he could not hit a cows arse with a shovel ... the fearles leg slip was heard to comment: "I'm closer to the batsman than I get to my wife"; as the ball was dispatched past him at speed he was heard to mutter that "it went further than he did on his holidays!!".
POSTSRCIPTS TO THE PREVIOUS GAME:
Sadly we have to report that the Pakistan wicket keeper's gloves were stolen from their lunchtime position by the stumps and then eaten by a rabid dog who pronuonced them quite tasty.
MATCH REPORT:
The big day .. the big game ..India v England in the Hyderabad Test Ground
A big crowd gathered to watch the cricketing titans face off; predictably India won but how we played!!
ENGLAND: 145 for 6 off 35 overs
INDIA: 146 for 2 off 22
WE WILL CELBRATE WITH THE MOTHER OF ALL SINGALONGS IN THE BAR
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