Of victory and celebrations

I’m a much more chipper cricketer than I was a few days ago when we last spoke and I’m sure you know why. We had a slippery start to our campaign with two losses and after that we were drilled with a few days of intense training and regrouping ahead of the trip to Navi Mumbai to play the Pune Warriors. It was a two hour flight and an hour’s drive to the stadium and even though it was more travel than I am used to, it was well worth it.

Wow! Was it a fantastic game or what? Each and every member of the squad played their part in the victory, be it the opening bowler, like Ashok Dinda, the opening batsmen, David Warner and Viru, the fielders, who showed great commitment and even me – who was carrying the refreshments for the boys. We won by three wickets and it really lifted our spirits.

A few of the boys celebrated afterwards at a party hosted by our hotel but the rest of the quieter ones, including me, decided to catch up on sleep, because we had an early flight back to Delhi. I’m still getting used to travel in India and the flight was very bumpy with lots of turbulence.

That’s not to say I didn’t find a way of celebrating, it was just a different way. David Warner and I decided to visit the DLF Emporio, which is on Nelson Mandela Road, in Delhi. If you are a shopaholic who enjoys spending money, this is the place to be. We found so many things but very little of it is cheap. My solution is not to eat for a week or two and save my meal allowance for my next trip there.

I’m headed off to the gym now because we’ve got an important game at home against the Chargers later this afternoon. I hope that I’ll have another victory to talk to you about later in the week.