After journeying hundreds of miles to some fine well tended grounds, I ended up on a park pitch in Pinner. You get what you deserve but no one deserves to bat at Pinner CC. The outfield and wicket are one the same.
I looked on feeling depressed and superior; depressed by this blot of a ground and superior because I reckoned that I was too good bat on rubbish like this. If I didn’t smash every ball for six, I was worse than the dobbers on offer.
But filth on a meadow is good enough for anyone and too good for me. Pinner’s batsmen batted on this track like it was the Oval of old; making it all look very easy, batting carefully and echoing poet Jeff Cloves thoughts on park cricketers everywhere: ‘we are cricketers here and we care, we care’.