Four Days in July
James Emmerson reflects on scoring the first Under-19 Test of the summer, between England and India, played at Chesterfield.
I was delighted to get a further opportunity to score an Under-19 Test through ACO this year, especially as I would be situated at Queens Park, Chesterfield, an historic out-ground of county cricket that I had driven past many times, but never visited.
The welcome from club volunteers was as warm as any I have received, with abundant food and drink – always a good sign. Not such a good sign was the view from the scorer’ s room – the sightscreens blocking off over half the playing area! My fellow scorer( young Sam Stringfellow) and I needed to meet players and officials we hoped could get this sorted out, and thankfully the groundsman obliged.
So that was one issue sorted – but a greater one loomed. Who on earth was who? The biggest challenge of these types of games is identifying players – no names or numbers on shirts in Test cricket. Thankfully, as England chose to field, Leicester’ s Harry Swindells, who missed out on this game, cheerfully spent half an hour with us, as myself, young Sam, Steve( scoreboard and PA) and Alex( Opta) made several notes – and got lucky when Ben Green, whose streaked hair made him popular with us, took a catch in the third over!
I had also politely dragooned one of the Indian squad into joining us.
‘ Life-saver’ Bhagath Varma helped us identify all his Indian colleagues!
Not speaking much English and never having been abroad, I offered a hesitant Bhagath Varma some of my supply of rocky road and shortbread, which he declared to be absolutely delicious. He was more than happy to stay with us after that, all smiles, as India hammered over 50 boundaries, establishing complete hegemony with 389-6 on the board at the close.
We did really well in the scorer’ s room. Not just because we got on, worked together, kept the score, and identified all the bowling changes and fielders, but also because we somehow managed to concentrate through the horrendous din created by the Chesterfield Pride festival taking place in the park that afternoon – no mean feat, I can tell you. Some five hours of booming PA, replete with endless caterwauling acts( including the Cheeky Girls)( yes, really) pushed everyone’ s patience to the limit, including the umpires, whose exchanges over the walkie-talkies were most amusing!
Thankfully, day two heralded much more pleasing sounds – the distinctive chatter of a decent cricket crowd, as the scorecards I produced quickly sold out. A volunteer did the donkey work of getting 150 copied up and there was some useful extra cash for the club as a result – glad to be of service! India were finally dismissed for 519 mid-afternoon, so now we had more fielders to identify. Bhagath found it highly amusing as our early efforts to work out who was where repeatedly floundered, but after about 10 overs we had cracked it.
In the sun-drenched final session, a small dog came onto the outfield and ran off with the ball! It was eventually retrieved and declared perfectly usable by the umps, but England ended the day probably wishing it had been lost in the lake, 355 behind and already four down.
Throughout the day both umpires kept in touch and were more than happy to share intervals with us at the same table, as well as a pre-match cup of tea.
That’ s not something all umpires do at these types of games, but both Jeremy Lloyds and Graham Lloyd were a credit to themselves and their profession, as they treated us all like part of the team.
Before the start on day three, it was a great pleasure to meet Richard Kettleborough. Having a few weeks off, he’ d discovered the fixture, travelling from his Sheffield home to what he told me was his father’ s club. His friendly, down-to-earth attitude, chatting with many locals, was really refreshing.
Play got underway and within an hour, England were all out and the grisly details of the collapse( 6 – 31 in 62 balls) were passed to the ECB media man for the website report. We then learned that India – with a lead of 324 – were not enforcing the follow-on! Given that the forecast had been awful for day four, it was baffling, but ultimately not our concern. In any event, it was soon raining – with boundaries – another commanding Indian batting display setting England 498 to win.
Despite captain Max Holden’ s best efforts, England were listing heavily to starboard by the close on 132-7, grateful for some naïve unhurried play by the Indians which denied them the opportunity for an extra half hour. We arrived for the final day presuming they would rue this, as the sodden scene and persistent showers indicated no chance of play, but the volunteer ground staff, in conjunction with the umpires, worked tirelessly and were finally rewarded with a start at 5.30. In the event, 31 minutes proved sufficient for the Indians to wrap up a thumping 334 run win, with quicks Kamlesh Nagarkoti and Shivam Mavi outstanding, sharing 16 wickets between them in the match. As we finished off our post-match scoring duties and shared farewells with all the staff, and the umpires, it was pleasing to reflect on a job well done and a great experience.
Above: Kamlesh Nagarkoti’ s 10th wicket of the match finishes the game.
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