“Don’t they look fantastic?!” said Dad, admiring the Pakistani fielders in their cream trousers, woven vests and fitted, woolen caps. We were seated twenty rows or so from the boundary fence, close enough to observe the inverted bowl shape of the MCG surface, more pronounced than it appears on TV, mowed to the millimeter in alternating emerald and pea green stripes.
Around us bald heads were already starting to sweat and blister in the sunshine, whilst skinny white legs poked out of oversized shorts and Gazman-polo-clad beer guts draped over downward facing belt buckles.
Of course, Dad and I were a little more formal; in our long sleeved shirts and jackets, impervious to the mid morning heat and both secretly believing that we could ourselves stride out into the middle at a moment’s notice and hold our own (should some freakish designated-survivor type situation call for it).
“Yeah they do look great”, I thought, “they’re like Gods out there, and we’re the mortals looking on”.
It was a million miles (and thirty years) from our first visit to this place together, when a rake-skinny schoolteacher and his frail, sniffly kid shivered in rain jackets in the outer regions of the northern stand to watch these same two teams fight it out in a weather-affected one-dayer. We haven’t exactly made it a tradition to go to games together since then, but a conceptual appreciation of cricket remains pivotal to our family dynamic.
Neither Dad nor I are passionate home side supporters (my Scottish-born Mum is actually a little more patriotic when it comes to Australian sport) and I’ve always suspected that it’s the ritual and pageantry of the game that keeps us hooked, rather than the score. We chatted throughout the day, occasionally touching on our plans for the coming year but mostly focused upon the minutiae of the spectacle before us; pondering questions such as “do the players all dine together in the lunch break?”, “do the umpires apologise to the batter whose protest at being given out on the field was vindicated by the DRS?” or “do the scorers still print dots, strokes and crosses in those big, green binder books?” (Thinking about it now I realise I forgot to ask Dad that last question out loud).
As the day rolled on the trio of middle-aged men in front of us (along with a teenage daughter) made two dollar bets on when the next dismissal would occur, all four of them underestimating the talent and determination of the Pakistani batters - at least for a while. Less surprised were the group of women in headscarves and tunics, cheering on each boundary, quick single or wicketless over with the kind of anxious fervour reserved for supporters of the underdog.
The tide eventually turned of course, as it so often does for Australia’s traveling opponents. A middle order collapse electrified the Shane Warne Stand and the crowd appeared to rise as one behind the tall, broad Australian fast bowlers as they peppered the tailenders with short stuff. At some points, the relatively inexperienced (and seemingly quite small) Pakistanis looked in genuine physical danger against the onslaught but they survived, in both the literal and the cricketing sense.
As the shadows grew we moved closer to the fence and sat ourselves down beside another father and son; this pair considerably more vocal that us; offering advice, encouragement and a little gentle razzing to the Aussie wicketkeeper and slips fielder who found themselves retrieving errant balls from under the sight-screen on seperate occasions. One ball even got lodged in some camera equipment, the hapless search for it providing a moment of two of the subtle comic-relief that typically punctuates a long day at the Test Match. Play ceased abruptly at six (despite the digital scoreboard promising thirteen more overs) and we filed out, alongside a the other forty thousand men, women and kids, most of us headed for Richmond Station.
It seems somehow fitting that, most of the time, you go home from a day of Test Cricket without witnessing a result. There was already much to discuss on the train, so talk of victory or defeat would have only been a distraction. Every third station seemed to prompt a memory for one or both of us, such as when Dad used to disembark at Toorak to play for Prahran Cricket Club, or when I’d skip out at South Yarra, change lines and head to Balaclava for my first ever recording sessions at Woodstock Studios. For all the changes that Melbourne has undergone, and even though neither Dad nor I had caught a train in years. this journey between Frankston and the MCG remains strikingly familiar. I guess with the change there is continuity, just like a day at the cricket.
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