Diary of a Vegan Cricketer (Week Fifteen)

Cricket? What Cricket! The stop/start nature of the season is heading more towards stop as I focus on the off season more and more. Is a three day Test really a Test? Who would be a Club Cricket selector? The importance of a Director of Cricket.

2024 Season Week Fifteen: July 8th – July 14th

Just when I felt batting was getting some momentum the rain returned (has it ever gone away) so no nets or coaching during the week, and Tuesdays Staffs game was called off. Add in a cancelled round of golf and it has been a very quiet week.

Other than walk the dogs and ongoing rehab I have had a lot of time to think ….. and wait!

Waiting is something I have done a lot of since I returned to playing in 2022: waiting for my body to stop hurting, waiting for the penny to finally drop that I am now 60, waiting for cricket to wake up and smell the coffee.

My season so far has been horrendous with the bat, good with the ball, and better in the field. The body is improving week by week and the potentail end game is better than I ever thought. Whilst this is great, it is increasingly frustrating as I can’t play and rehab/train and find myself focussed more on off season plans than on the games themselves, and in all honesty am considering calling it a day for this season and getting an extra two months rehab done before starting training.

Two things I will be doing post season: 1) writing up my experience and thoughts on being a Vegan Cricketer, and 2) producing a NBCC transition guide for Club Cricket.

The later will be a bit of a minefield as I try and navigate between the need to be more professional and disciplined and the fact that club cricket depends on volunteers and goodwill.

This is certainly the case with selection where so much needs to be balanced: putting out your strongest team against giving everyone a game, rewarding those who come to training against those who don’t but are better players, picking your team on selection night against waiting for players to decide if they are available.

I would make a terrible Chairman of Selectors because I am too structured and disciplined. I would have a clear selection policy for the club, a deadline for availability to be confirmed and a view that players had to want to play for the club rather than the club wanted them, and I would prioritise giving players early notice of selection so they and their families could make plans.

On the other hand I increasingly think I would contribute well as Director of Cricket, a role I rarely see being done well, primarily because it is often incorporated with selection which immediately creates a conflict of interest: developing the club (long term) or putting out the strongest teams (short term).

I did get one game played this week for Church Eaton 2s. We won the toss and fielded on a rainy off/on day and they scored 260+ = game over. Bowled OK but shoulder really sore, damaged middle finger on bowling hand fielding off my own bowling, had the customary dropped catches and ‘not getting to it’, but bowled a tidey 8 over for 35 which given the excellent hitting by a couple of their batters could have been a lot worse. Bowling with a migraine was no fun, and nor was batting …. for what little I did (again) given we were 20 for 4 when I walked to the crease, and 21 for 5 when I returned having failed to pick which of the twi balls I could see was the right one to hit.

Off the field I went to Edgbaston on Friday night with Sands to the T20 ‘local derby’ against Worcester, a pleasant social event with friends, a good win for Worcester, but quite a subdued atmosphere and much smaller crowd than usual for the derby game. Mind you the weather once again was wet and cold!

The Lords Test pretty much passed me by. I turned down an invite to go to the First Day as it all seems too much hassle getting to London these days, I spend far too much tine away from home during the summer as it is, and I really am not a fan of hospitality and increasingly see it as more evidence of how entitled and elitist cricket still is, and appears set on remaining. I thought it somewhat telling that the Red for Ruth day was on the second day this year – as if they didn’t have confidence the WIndies would last until the 4th day …. and they were right. Cricket will not survive on Tests that last 2 & 1/3rd days. Can’t see the sense in Anderson only playing the first test but I thought he had a very fitting end: didn’t face a ball, and his last ball was congratulating the new bowler on a great performance. Decent – as he himself. Broad the Showman rightly got the final test befitting his personality and so did Anderson. Opposites do attract, and they certainly make for a truly great partnership from two truly great bowlers.

No vegan news this week? Not really. I prefer to take my own food when I play or watch as I am increasingly focussed on my health and what I eat, so a healthy home made hummus, spinach and felafel wrap beats whatever is available. To be fair (and clear) I did this when I ate meat, and when I went vegetarian …. I have never been a huge fan of convenience food or party food.

I would mention the football but I really have no interest in it at all these days.