October has begun, and the cricket season is over. Even the hardiest village cricketer will now have pulled stumps and hung up their whites. That’s our lot now, until April.
The death of summer, and the demise of the season, go hand in hand, each a symbol of the other. As the leaves turn golden and fall, and the air turns crisp, you return the kit bag to the loft as a melancholy metaphor for the relentless onwards march of time, for nature’s inexorable cycle of renewal and decay. For glories passed and never to return.
The irony is – so typical of cricket – that just as the fixture schedule ends, the weather has turned glorious. Why wasn’t it like this in August, when the rain fell during every match? I’ve lost count of the number of years when the sun has shone warmly in March and October, but it’s pissed down for the six months in-between.
In village cricket, this is the time of year when the club secretary says, “never again – I’m retiring”. Only to find, inevitably, that no one else can be bothered – so he gets roped into it again for the twenty-third season in a row.
AGMs are held. Pledges are made to buy a new pair of gloves for the kit bag. Opponents for next season are dropped for being unreliable/annoying. You promise that, now you have more spare time, you’ll finally get round to updating the website. But you never quite manage it.
On the TV, there’ll still be plenty of cricket to watch – as long as you enjoy getting up in the middle of the night. We’re in India for an ODI series in a few weeks, and later in Dubai for tests against Pakistan.
While everyone else shivers in the grip of a British winter, it’s golden summer for Charles Colville, who gets to spend three months talking to Robert Croft and Bob Willis in an underground bunker at Sky’s Osterley studios.
Poor old Charles spends all year waiting for this privilege. And I’m sure we’ll be there to join him in front of the TV, every morning from 3.30am.
For me, the winter is when Test Match Special comes into its own. I rarely listen when we’re at home – but during tours, there’s something both soothing and exotic about lying under the duvet and being transported to Madras or Colombo. And it’s easier than getting out of bed to switch the TV on.
But the truth is that unless it’s an Ashes winter, cricket occupies little of the national consciousness between October and March. Dismally, football seeps into every pore. Hyperbole, machismo, transfer speculation, dullards – all abound during the long months of winter. The alternatives – rugby and jumps racing – do little to cheer the soul.
Suddenly, next April seems a very long way away…
Maxie Allen
Wonderful stuff…I will no doubt be sitting as Fixture Secretary, and making the annual cull of opponents who have not played the game properly (St Albans IIs, you have been ex-communicated from our list, good riddance).