Today I did something pointless. And all the more so perhaps, given how cold it was, and with the grey skies overhead constantly threatening rain.
But whilst the match at the County Ground in Taunton, being a pre-season friendly, had no points resting on it, my spending a couple of hours watching wasn’t in the least bit senseless.
Because I, and the other couple of hundred who were there, experienced a shared reality – as we watched the game, quite literally, play out in real time. We saw what really happened – and not some version of events presented to us by someone with a particular story to sell.
Which these days, it seems to me, is increasingly rare.
I can’t trust everything that I see in the news because, no matter how truthful the reporter, whatever they say can only ever be a portion of the truth. And I can’t trust certain public figures who have a relationship with the truth that is, at best, flexible. But I can trust what my own eyes saw: that Lewis Gregory struck a cracking boundary from the 20th delivery he faced, only to be caught, just three balls later, by Norton off the bowling of Gorvin.
And in a world where far too much is fake, it’s good to experience something real once in a while.
And then there was the opportunity to see Jack Leach and Craig Overton batting – neither of whom, as far as I could tell, threatened to ‘unleash hell’ on the opposition or become their ‘worst nightmare’ if they weren’t offered up gentle full tosses.
Instead they just played cricket, putting on 93 together, whilst I watched. And we all forgot, for an hour or two at least, about the absolutely senseless things that continue elsewhere in the world. And remembered that some good things remain.
Which, on reflection, didn’t seem pointless at all.
Other cricket related posts:
Cricketing blogs from 2025:
To read ‘The Untold Story of Finals’ Day’, click here
To read ‘Only A Day Away’, click here
To read ‘No smoke without fire’, click here
To read ‘Importantly, why cricket doesn’t matter’, click here
To read ‘I Spy Somerset’s 150th Anniversary Season’, click here
To read ‘A Spring Watch’, click here
Cricketing blogs from 2024:
To read ‘Reasons to be cheerful’, click here
To read ‘First of the Summer Wine’, click here
To read ‘Safe and Sound at the County Ground, Taunton’, click here
To read ‘Is Cricket Amusing Itself to Death’, click here
To read ‘A Purr-fect day at the cricket’, click here
To read ‘Worth Every Penny’, click here
To read ‘The Somerset Cricket Emporium – 2024’, click here
To read ‘One Fine Day’, click here
To read ‘WWFD – what would Freddie do?’, click here
To read ‘A Shady News Story’, click here
To read ‘The Abolition of County Cricket’, click here
Cricketing blogs from 2023:
To read ‘20 Things we have learnt this summer’, click here
To read ‘When rain stops play’, click here
To read ‘Only a game’, click here
To read ‘The Hundred: is cricket amusing itself to death?’, click here
To read ‘The Somerset Cricket Emporium – 2023’, click here
To read ‘for the third time of asking, CRICKET’S COMING HOME…surely’, click here
To read ‘Twas the week of the final’, click here
To read ‘Sharing the important things: on introducing your grandchild to cricket’, click here
To read ‘Somerset v Nottinghamshire T20 Quarter Final 2023’, click here
To read ‘Breaking News’, click here
To read ‘Lewis Calpaldi – Retired Hurt?’, click here
To read ‘Cricket: It’s All About Good Timing’, click here
To read ‘Bazball, Bazchess, Bazlife’, click here
To read ‘Online criticism: it’s just not cricket’, click here
To read ‘Cigarettes, Singles, and Sipping Tea with Ian Botham: Signs of a Well Spent Youth!’, click here
To read ‘A Historic Day’, click here
To read ‘Cricket – through thick and thin’, click here
To read ‘Stumpy: A Legend Reborn’, click here
To read ‘my love is NOT a red, red rose’, click here
Cricketing blogs from previous years:
To read ‘A Cricketing Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story’, click here
To read ‘Scooby Doo and the Mystery of the Deseted Cricket Ground’, click here
To read ‘Brian and Stumpy visit The Repair Shop’, click here
To read ‘A Tale of Two Tons’, click here
To read ‘A Song for Brian’, click here
To read ‘A Somerset Cricket Players Emporium 2022’ click here
To read ‘A Cricket Taunt’, click here
To read ‘A Song for Brian’, click here
To read ‘At Season’s End’, click here
To read ‘A Day at the Cricket’, click here
To read ‘The Great Cricket Sell Off’, click here
To read ‘On passing a village cricket club at dusk one late November afternoon’ click here
To read ‘How the Grinch stole from county cricket…or at least tried to’. click here
To read ‘How Covid-19 stole the the cricket season’, click here
To read ‘A Cricket Tea Kind of a Day’, click here
To read ‘Life in the slow lane’, click here
To read ‘Frodo and the Format of Power’, click here
To read ‘If Only’, click here
To read ‘I’ve got a little CRICKET list’, click here
To read ‘Eve of the RLODC limericks’ click here
To read ‘It’s coming home…’, click here
To read ‘A Song for Ben Green’, click here
To read ‘Enough Said…’, the last section of which is cricket related, click here
A Jack Leach Trilogy:
To read ‘For when we can’t see why’, click here
To read ‘WWJD – What would Jack Do?’, click here
To read ‘On Playing a Blinder’, click here
To read ‘Coping with Disappointment’, click here
And to finish – a couple with a theological flavour
To read ‘Somerset CCC – Good for the soul’, click here
To read ‘Longing for the pavilion whilst enjoying a good innings’, click here
Some musings 