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Joanna Gray
Joanna Gray is a writer and confidence coach
While the armada of small boats, social distress in Makerfield and the ghoulish resurrection of Tony Blair give the impression that England long ago dissolved into Yookay squalor, I want to reassure Daily Sceptic readers: this is not so. Deep England still hums away among the glory of the English countryside. If you are feeling despair about the decline of the nation, I urge you immediately to find your local village cricket team and get involved – for there, you will find the beloved beat of the nation’s heart.
“Beware of the bull!” read the sign along the fence. A whopper of a Herefordshire bull dozed lazily amongst the buttercups. We parked alongside the fence and carried our camping chairs to the edge of the adjacent cricket pitch. Two village under-13 teams were playing on a pitch nestled behind an 11th-century church and the manor house. Sixes are possible but rarely fours: the pitch inclines gently like a shallow dish and the balls roll hopefully towards the boundary before petering out and sliding back again.
At matches such as this, for three or so hours, worries are suspended and the only reality concerns stacking up sufficient runs in the blazing heat. Bottles of water are poured on boys’ heads as they pad up and sweat it out scampering for one or two runs when possible. Fielders are shifted when the left-handed batsman comes on and everyone claps when he manages a six over his shoulder. When the ninth batsman trudges back with his third duck of the season he is greeted with nothing more than: “Bad luck.” Depending on the club, teas are lavish, consist of bacon baps and coffees, or warnings are issued beforehand that there is no tea, and sweaty snacks are eaten out of kit bags. There is often a mum who brings large batches of muffins or sliced watermelon to share.
Children’s village cricket training is usually a social event for the adults as well, if the village is large enough. Our club is lucky enough to train on the same day as ‘social tennis’ and the Brownies in the village hall. Afterwards everyone converges on the clubhouse for drinks and a BBQ at the “Ashes” – the sign, of course, felt-tip on cardboard. Aside from a new notice on the clubhouse wall with a densely typed list of ‘respect’ expectations from the ECB, village cricket is entirely woke-free. Boys and girls still wear whites. Coaches are all volunteers and manage to instil a spirit of fair play above anything else. When town teams turn up in coloured pyjama-style cricket gear there is a sigh of understanding that the competition may be rather stiffer than usual.
Men’s village cricket is the place to go to experience a slower kind of life. Our eldest ensured he was home from his gap year on an Australian cattle farm for the village summer cricket season. The team includes our middle son, an assortment of ages and occupations and whoever else can commit to 40 overs on a Saturday and 15 on a Tuesday evening. Banter is gentle and fitness optional. The more enthusiastic members of the team lean on their bats for a pre-match stretch. Our 11-year-old watched the other evening: they were a man down, so put him in as third leg.
What is most joyous about village cricket is, for me at least, seeing hidden corners of England that are only visited when a game is on. What3words is obligatory to find deep hedgerows with a fence post topped with a cricket ball to indicate the concealed entrance to the pitch. Last week, we travelled only miles away to an entirely hidden pitch where we were overlooked by an avenue of limes and an obelisk raised by a squire in memory of his son lost at Inkerman. At another club, a sign above the rudimentary clubhouse toilets, written on the back of a box of tea, read: “Beware: HORNETS.”
Memory maps of villages are formed, not geographically, but rather as the location of supreme sporting achievements: the six that hit the church door, the tumbling stop at the boundary, the miraculous one scored by the spin bowler famous for his ducks. There are 5,000 cricket clubs according to the England and Wales Cricket Board, with most clubs fielding numerous teams. Over 600 new girls’ teams and 550 new women’s teams have been set up. As with all sports, it is the ultimate social leveller: the lawyer being caught out by the mechanic. Pints are enjoyed afterwards, and the Pakistani groom, who is the best cricketer on the team, is asked at every round if he is absolutely sure he wants a Coke and not a Cruzcampo.
Restore faith in the lands and people of this great nation by joining a village cricket team: play, coach, learn to score, make teas, spectate. At moments when a pot-bellied farmer’s son reaches for an unlikely catch, and the shadows of the low-setting sun send streaks of pink through the poplars, it is possible to believe John Major when he said in 1993: “Fifty years from now, Britain will still be the country of long shadows on county cricket grounds.”
This article was originally published by the Daily Sceptic.
