England Vs Australia , Lords, Second Ashes Test 2015
I had moved to Manchester in the summer of 2015 just at the time an Ashes series was about to commence. Incidentally on the weekend of the 2nd test match at Lords, I planned a trip to London to meet my friends. An Ashes test match at Lords was surely something for the CV, I thought. Being in London, it was surely worth a try. My friend Rahul who is settled here for many years agreed and so we made our trip to St Johns Wood on the Saturday morning. Of course by the time we reached, the morning session was over and it was almost lunch. That really didn’t matter as there were still 4 hours or 60 overs of cricket ahead of us. An Ashes test match at Lords would surely be a sell-out on a Saturday so the only hope was to get hold of some of the touts selling tickets in black. Rahul suggested it was surely worth a try. The first quote that we got was for 150 GBP and subsequently it reduced to 125. For two sessions was it really worth it, I thought. At the same time, my cricket loving friends on my whatsapp group went on hype mode. My friend Madhu needlessly hyped the event so much as if he is living to watch an Ashes test at Lords and that its a bucket-list item for him. And that I should go ahead and live his dream. The event was far from being classified as a bucketlist item despite the English fans hyping it up every 2 years but I fell for it. I mean it was a normal test match. Nothing can beat peer pressure and I insisted on accepting the 125 offer. Had it been a few years later, I would have outright rejected as I would realize the value of those pounds but at that time it was just hard to resist coming so close. Poor Rahul had to reluctantly give in to my urge and I can imagine what a waste it was for him. As I entered and walked up the steps I felt the goose-bumps and excitement and more so as Mitchel Johnson steamed in. The urge to take photos and check-ins took over and I hardly had the focus to follow the game. The stadium was surely majestic with the pavilion on one end and the iconic capsule shaped JP Morgan media centre on the other. All I knew was Australia was dominating and England was on the verge of conceding a huge first innings lead. During the tea break there were some activities going on at the Nursery end and we even spotted the former England spinner Shaun Udal addressing a group. Post tea session we managed to get a better view from the stand just next to the JP Morgan media centre. All that enabled us to do was take more photos from different angles, with a majestic view of the pavilion. At the end of the day it was truly a memorable experience though the worth of the pounds spent is still debatable. I ended up buying a Lords souvenir sweatshirt. Madhu went gaga over my photographs at Lords as if I have climbed Mount Everest. Ironically when many years later he visited Lords for a game in the 2019 world cup, he dozed off for a while during the afternoon session. Great place for a summer outing though.
For the record, Australia won the test match convincingly the next day itself but lost the series 3-2, with all the 5 tests hopelessly one-sided
England Vs India, Birmingham, First Test 2018
A dream summer for any expatriate Indian cricket fan in England or Australia is when team India is touring that country for a bilateral test series. One must argue that even a world cup falls into that category but this one is more special as its entirely about us in a foreign land.
I got my dream in the summer of 2018 as India was set to tour England for 5 test matches (and a few ODIs and T20Is as well which I do not really care about outside a world cup).
The series kicked off at Edgbaston, Birmingham and it was in my catchment area. I was living in Northampton and I had little hesitation in booking my tickets at a premium from viagogo.com for the Saturday.
Tests in England traditionally start on a Thursday but with the cramped up calendar, all those traditions have gone for a toss and ECB ended up starting the test on Wednesday, which meant that Saturday will be the 4th day. Tests these days hardly go into the fifth day and we get lucky if it stretches to the end of day 4, which all the more highlighted the poor scheduling on part of ECB when we should be trying to maximize weekend time for test matches. Probably ending a test match on Monday would delay the next test match.
The test match itself was a cricket lover’s dream with multiple twists and turns and it was even-stevens on completion of both first innings with our captain scoring a masterful 149 under difficult conditions and top-class swing bowling out of a total of 274 resulting in just a 12 run lead for England when it could have been much more.
As the third day progressed I was quite relaxed as surely it looked that we will have a full day 4. After all I was sure Indian bowlers will not be bowling out England in a day. But then this was a different Indian team which depended on their bowlers now to save their ass after the batsmen have failed. Ashwin started off with a peach of a ball to dismiss Cook and then Ishant Sharma bowled a dream spell to have England tottering at 85-7. More than half a day to go, just 98 ahead. Under normal circumstances this would have been a dream. As an Indian cricket fan an away test win means the most to me and here our bowlers were bowling us to a famous victory inside 3 days to go 1-0 up in the test series. But this time the scenario was different. I had my Saturday at stake, well planned out, travel followed by cricket under the summer sun.
As my friends cheered for every wicket on our Whatsapp group, I turned into a deshdrohi urging England lower order to take this into the 4th day. Fortunately or unfortunately, Sam Curran took my wish seriously and mounted a counter attack which took their final lead to 194 with a session and a bit still remaining. There would a 4th day after all and a Birmingham trip for me. Though surely it will not last for that 2 hours. An Indian win will somewhat compensate for the loss of those 4 hours of watching cricket, I thought. That soon took a big blow as Indian batsmen, barring captain Virat Kohli were clueless against Anderson and co. We were 112/5 at stumps with 72 more to win. Kohli being there being the glimmer of hope.
At least my Saturday was somewhat saved. I could travel to Birmingham and could enjoy up to 2 hours of action and possibly an Indian win. On the flip-side, it could get over in half hour.
The sun was shining brightly as I set off for Birmingham from Northampton packing a cup of Starbucks from the station. For a moment I let the duration of the match go out of my mind. I took the shuttle bus service from Birmingham New Street Station to Edgbaston and settled myself in the gallery praying that we win and even if we lose, at least let me enjoy 2 hours of action. It was an absolute safe wish I thought, 2 hours of action would surely guarantee an Indian win.
That was not to happen. Dinesh Karthik fell for nothing even before the sparse crowd was settling in. There was still hope as Kohli was in sublime form and Hardik Pandya quite a handy bat. Kohli brought up 50 in style through a leg-glance captured well on my DSLR camera, but was soon trapped in front by Stokes in the very next over. The writing was on the wall now considering our non-existent lower order. Hardik delayed the inevitable for a while but we folded up for 162 falling short by 31 runs. That gave me around 90 minutes of viewing time and a whole day to kill. I just could not drag myself out of the stadium. All the eateries would remain open so decided to hang around. I had a customary beer followed by a chicken tikka lunch in the stadium before finally leaving Edgbaston at afternoon. To further kill time I walked around Birmingham City Centre like a tourist, visited the bull ring (mall), saw a few structures not seen before and then finally called it a day in the early hours of the evening. A bitter-sweet experience leaving a somewhat hollow feeling. Did not get either the win or substantial hours of play.
