How the passion for play bowled a maiden over (3 May 1999)

3 May 1999

How the passion for play bowled a maiden over

Sybil Ruscoe

I fell in love during the 1992 World Cup - so my passion for the competition is forever entangled with that heady, addictive atmosphere that comes with the first flush of romance.

It was a strange affair - with a shared desire for each other and England's progress, we took our careful, tentative first steps together as our team strode their path towards the final against Pakistan.

There were long, sleepless nights on the sofa, not of canoodling, but of goggled-eyed TV watching as we sat wedded to the live coverage from Australia and New Zealand. This was grown-up romance - the backdrop was cricket and it was to be taken seriously.

As with every love affair there was a soundtrack, and 'our songs' came from the MTV hits that punctuated the coverage as we flicked to the music channel during the adverts.

I recall as if it were yesterday. The lonely, small hours' rumble of London taxi-cabs, the birdsong of the dawn chorus and the tinkling of the milk bottles invading the quieter moments as the sun rose over Camden and signalled the close of play on the other side of the world.

We'd stumble, bleary-eyed off to work, fuelled by coffee and bacon sandwiches; survive a day at the office and the knowing looks from colleagues; and then grab a fitful couple of hours of tea-time sleep ready for the start of play and our all-night cricket parties.

Seven years on we prepare, older, wiser, with passion undimmed, for another session of marathons in front of the TV. It's a mouth-watering prospect. A winter of one-dayers served up from Australia, the Caribbean and Sharjah has provided a tasty hors-d'oeuvre for the feast to come.

If there was a moment for cricket to convert the doubters and the generation of 'screenagers' wearing out their fingers on keyboards instead of the playing fields - then this is it.

And there can be no better role model than South Africa's Jonty Rhodes, one of Wisden's five cricketers of the year.

Here's a man who plays cricket with God-given joy. His Mortal Kombat fuelled by pure enjoyment, to see him leap and pluck a ball out of thin air with the beaming smile that unfailingly follows is surely the finest example of sportsmanship.

But the World Cup has its more ferocious competitors, too. None more fierce than the tall, spitting and cursing demon in the shape of Australia's Glenn McGrath - self-styled bad boy, but probably the best fast bowler in the world.

And there are the masters of the mysteries of spin bowling. The double-jointed magician from Sri Lanka, Muttiah Muralitharan; and the blonde bombshell, Shane Warne, as colourful as any character from a sun-soaked soap.

Oh that England had such super-heroes for our youngsters to emulate. But then again, could this be the time for Andrew Flintoff to displace Owen and Beckham from the bedroom-wall space?

Not to be forgotten, as in the FA Cup, are the minnows - including 500-1 outsiders Scotland. Last summer, I watched the opening game of the 'other' World Cup, between Scotland and Brazil, in a beer-soaked marquee in Glasgow with 3,000 kilted members of the Tartan Army. The Scots will be looking to Gavin Hamilton to produce some of the Braveheart spirit when Scotland do battle at Worcester in their opening game against Australia.

So, weather permitting, the stage is set for a glorious cricketing summer.

Of course, Test cricket remains the Sergeant Pepper of the game, but the World Cup one-dayer is the Spice Girls Live - a colourful, uncomplicated burst of energy that should switch on a whole new audience to the game.

The purists know it's not the real thing, but they can't help tapping their feet and tuning in to the brash newcomer on the international stage.

And as for my personal partnership - purist on one side of the sofa; enthusiast on the other - it has survived its own sticky wickets and, like the one-day game itself, has changed and matured down the years. We have grown used to the fancy dress, the sunglasses and the warpaint - and, in time, I suppose we will even accept numbers on players' backs.

We have watched the evolution of field-placing: the gladiators corralled in the circle for those first, crucial 15 overs. We've argued about the England team-sheet. Should they go for specialist batsmen and bowlers who excel in the Test match arena, or pick the bits-and-pieces men, the Ealhams and the Crofts, whose unsung craftsmanship can often confound the genius of the Laras and Tendulkars? The jury's out on that one.

And we have taken on board the arrival of the pinch-hitter - a gift from American baseball, the wayward son of the English game.

So, we're counting down the days and preparing to party once again at the 'carnival of cricket'. But this time, thankfully, at rather more civilised hours.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)