Sport Hurts...

Cricket based email, glossary below.

First glimpse of 1st XI cricket in Argentina and I like it. After two warm up games for the Second XI which involved a whole number of incidents that I would rather not discuss in much depth - clapping the batsman in, bowling more slowly at their weaker players, saying 'Well done' and other unseemly histrionics of that nature - the gentleman's game began this Sunday.

Aided by the fastest, bounciest wicket I've ever played on (artifical strip, with 'golf ball bounce'), things kicked into action in the 2nd over when I apparently very clearly hit a ball and didn't walk. After being called some names by the bowler, each of which were simultaneously translated by the wicket keeper, I was peppered by short stuff and verbals for the next 20 minutes.

Batting in a floppy sunhat wasn't a great idea, and I couldn´t call for a helmet either, because my fellow batsmen each came in wearing it, and I didn't have the heart to ask them to give it back. Fortunately I got out before I experienced anything painful, a fate that the following batsman could not avoid, kopping a bouncer on the head, requiring medical attention, the removal of much blood from the playing surface, an ambulance, several calls to ensure he had medical insurance before the ambulancemen would put him on a stretcher, and, eventualy, 7 stitches.

Game resumed... arguments broke out, players had to seperated, I lost the plot after being called for a no-ball and a free hit (I tried to explain a rule I cannot explain in English to the umpire, with unsurprising lack of success; subsequent 'free hit' delivery hit the batsman on the helmet), one father then chased his son most of the way to and then along the boundary after said son had dropped a catch off his old man's bowling, and we lost by 1 wicket. Two players refused to shake hands, calling each other the most intimate parts if a parrot, which is how you use the c word in Spanish.

Two words. Sport. Brilliant.

Glossary of terms for the ignorant.
- cricket = obsure fetish of an English sport involving several sticks, pristine white clothing and some leather
- 2nd over = an over is 6 balls, a ball is a delivery, a delivery is when the bowler throws the leather at the sticks. This was the 2nd of those.
- no ball = if a ball bowled reaches the batsman above stump height it is a no ball. But not a free hit, which everyone knows is only for a 'front foot' no ball.
- 'walking' = a fool's game. The dying art of 'admitting' to the opposition that you have hit the ball, saving the umpire the necessity of making the decision. (In fact, it's very interesting, see next entry)