The Opening Day of the County Championship

Great bowling. Horrendous batting. Men and women talking about sandwiches. Burned to a crisp.  Sober. Drunk. Hungover.  Drunk again. Tired. Freezing. Boiling. Cider.  Tail end runs. Friends. Shouts from the crowd only during the final session. Local players. South Africans. The elderly reminiscing about their youth. The score board never working. Parochial and glorious.  Frustration. Jubilation. The opening day of the Championship.

The opening day of the Championship is one of the most beautiful pieces of antiquity we have in this country. Like many of its attendees, it sits a little decrepit, weighed down by generations used to instant gratification and the English Cricket Board (ECB), which does little to protect the grand old man of sport in its dotage.

Occasions like Somerset vs. Essex on Good Friday show exactly why the Championship ought to be treasured. Around 3,000 braved the potential anger of family members visiting over Easter to see a day of quality cricket. To see the creaking frame of Marcus Trescothick pull on his pads for a 25^th season in a final push to gain Somerset's maiden title. To see England’s greatest ever run scorer Alistair Cook prove that he has not lost any of his passion for cricket despite relinquishing the test captaincy. This is all well and good, but people with a far higher knowledge of the game can write at length in match reports about Cook’s century, Abell’s questionable captaincy and Bopara’s sledging. There is so much more to the richness of Championship cricket that lies behind 22 men attempting to win a game and that is what I want to touch upon.

I was lucky enough to watch the opening session in the midst of a dozen men of a certain age, many of whom had not seen each other in the six months since the last time that Somerset played on home ground. Besides the passionate talk of cricket, you hear tales of family, holidays and many, many ailments. Some have been friends since school. However, many have met in their middle and old age and become friends, not just because of a shared love of the game, but also because the game itself gives them the time and opportunity to do so. A chance to reflect on the trivialities of life on which all good relationships are built.

The clock ticks over to lunch and there is the smell of fish and chips and a glittering array of sandwiches which are discussed with unreasonable details; “you can really taste the horseradish” is not a refrain you would likely here while at Anfield or Stamford Bridge and it’s all the more welcome as a result. It’s also around this time of day that some of the hardier souls brave the first of many pints of brown ale for the season, inevitably walking back to their seats in a jauntier manner than before it was purchased.

There is no scientific research confirming that you get most sunburnt in the afternoon session, though from the steady hum of anecdote in the audience, in addition to the peeling skin on my forehead, I can confidentially confirm it as a theory at least. It’s also part and parcel of opening day cricket, wedged within the schizophrenic arms of April weather. Equal parts Artic and Saharan, freezing in the shade and melting in the Sun. Every item of clothing that you own is thoroughly inappropriate for the conditions.

The ebb and flow of people from seats starts as they look at the new parts of the ground that have been erected or deconstructed over the winter. People visit the club shop and complain about the price of replica shirts. You fade in and out, perhaps knit, perhaps read the paper. Whatever you do, it is done with a backdrop infinitely more pleasant than that offered by garish daytime television.

By the time tea comes and goes, you will find that the aforementioned hardy souls are well lubricated enough to offer words of encouragement to the players at a volume slightly louder than they would have done in the morn. The sun is dragged down from the sky and the first pangs of sadness enter the mind that you have but an hour or so left of the day to enjoy. Those men of a certain age leave early, exchange goodbyes and offer assurances that of course they will be back again the following day (family permitting, of course). Ready to do so again and again and again until the linearity of life allows them to do so no more.

Light in the sky dwindles at pace, glasses are drained faster still. Jackets are drawn shut and hats pulled down. It will rain, although the sky is under no obligation to do so. Bails are drawn from the stumps and however Siberian the weather, there will still be a handful chuntering about how ‘of course they should have played on’.

So it ends. Though people will leave pleased or displeased depending on the state of play, almost all will have an overarching sense of satisfaction that they spent eight hours in the company of such people and in such an environment.

While not intended to be another piece of vitriol aimed at the ECB, losing days like this in Championship would be to rip apart a little piece of Britain’s fabric. In the relentless drive for modernisation, it is important to remember what got you to such a point in the first place and, where possible, protect it. It’s not simply about bat vs. ball, but the days and moments like this where friendships are forged, renewed and expanded upon in a manner you simply can’t accomplish with eight pints of lager and 90 minutes of heavy hitting. To lose these days would be a crying shame for more than just the sport of cricket, it would be a loss to the human condition.