Northampton vs Australia at Northampton

I Get All Hot and Bothered When I See the Australian Cricket Team!!!!!!!!

Listening to Don Henley as I write .....

Today had been a day I was looking forward to for ages. It has been many years since I've been to a cricket match and many many years since I have seen the Australians play. I love cricket, well what else would you expect from a Yorkshire lass, but I really really love the Australian cricketers. I think I imagine them to all be like Joe Harman, the hero from Neville Shute's A Town Like Alice, rugged, heroic, sexy, handsome, but with the rough edge (and yes I know that covers quite a lot of stereotyping of Australian men but .......) and a lot of the team are rugged, heroic, sexy etc etc. Some of my favourite cricketers are Australian, with the exception of Sir Ian of course, Simon O'Donnell (who didn't love watching him slog the ball), Mark Taylor, Terry Alderman, Alan Border, Warnie etc etc, and in this bunch well Brett Lee and Shaun Clarke. Now I'm having a hot flush ......

Members of the Test team - Watson, Hussey

So today we headed to Wantage Road, County Ground the home of Northamptonshire CCC, with our picnic, sun-screen and high hopes of an interesting days cricket - and that is what we got. A super day's cricket, lots and lots of sunshine, a lovely picnic. We arrived just in time to get to our seats and they were perfect, we had a brilliant view of all of the day's action, near a bar and fairly close to the loo, (well close enough to see when there wasn't a queue) what could be better. We even had 3 old blokes sat behind us who chatted away all day about the cricket, I thought it was really sweet, Mike thought they should shut up!

The day started with the news that Michael Hussey has retired out, which was unusual in itself, I guess it was to allow some of the other batsmen a chance to have a bat and get some match practice. Australia were coming into the match, after a loss at Lords and the momentum in the Ashes being very much in England's favour. The Aussies were doing well and eventually declared for 308 for 8, which meant we got to see them bowling. Sadly Brett Lee was still injured, so I was not expecting to see him bowl. Watson, Hussey, North, MacDonald and Manou all did well with the bat.

Shaun Clarke in action with the ball, the batsman was having to dodge it!



Shaun Clarke signing autographs and keeping an eye on play.

When the Aussies came into bowl it was going to be interesting, as Mitchell Johnson who has not been bowling anywhere near his best was playing, as was Shaun Clarke, in many ways they were playing for a place in the Test Team. Sadly Johnson was still struggling and his bowling was still all over the place he finished the Northans innings with figures of 7-48-0, whereas Clarke bowled 14-45-2, Clarke, like Terry Alderman is a good bowler for English conditions, anyway time will tell if he makes it into the Test team. (Note - he made it into the Headingly Test Match and bowled very very well, one of the reasons the Aussie's won, Mitchell Johnson returning to form helped too! The Australian batsman knew how to hit the ball too, which really helped, perhaps the England batman want to try it next time, they might find it works quite well!!!!!!)

Mitchell Johnson warming up

Northants declared on 226 for 7 and the Aussies were back in again. We had had a bit of excitement earlier in the day when Ricky Ponting passed right by us to head to the NCCC gym, to quite a bit of abuse (funny abuse not nasty). One of the trainers was watching the match near where we were sitting and got a bit of stick from some of the crowd, who came out with all the cliches, although when he shouted "call that a knife, this is a knife", it caused quite a bit of merriment, but these guys are real pros and have heard it all before. Not long after this point, and luckily Jamie was hanging about hoping to catch 'Ricky' to get his autograph, that Hughes sent a 6 right onto Jamie's seat, had Jamie been sat there he may well have needed new teeth!

Ricky Ponting

I went expecting not to get even a glimpse of Brett Lee, but I was far from disappointed as during the lunch break, along with his physio, he jogged around the pitch about 6 times so I managed to get a couple of photos and some video of him, then later he also went to the gym so got an even closer look, I was satisfied. He got some good natured stick from the crowd too, but he can take it!

Brett Lee, woop woop!!!

Jamie enjoyed himself, he read and played his DS as well as watching the cricket, Mike enjoyed a beer or two and dozed in the heat and I watched the play, really enjoying it all. We had 3 old chaps sat behind us and they were happy chatting away for most of the day, but were good fun to listen to as they knew what they were talking about with the cricket. The smurfs gave us all a laugh and worked hard to get a handful of Mexican waves going, the guys in the satin shirts looked good too. Jamie and I walked round the ground and spotted the Aussie tour bus - well it amused us!.

We had a super day and will be heading back to Northants cricket sooner rather than later and Australia went on to win the match by 135 runs.

So here is where I can say that one of my life's all time dreams would be to go to the Boxing Day Test Match in Melbourne. Australia is the number 1 place I would like to visit and hopefully we will get there one day, perhaps for our 50th Birthdays - how about that Mike!

Ciao

Sue

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