The gentleman's game.

On Wednesday I was thumbing through the Derby Telegraph when I came across an article alerting me to the fact that England was playing Pakistan in a Test Match at Trent Bridge. Trent Bridge is in Nottingham, and Nottingham is next door to Derby! I went immediately into planning mode and, to cut a long story short, on Friday we were headed to the match.
I'd had a difficult morning, with lots of little things getting on my tits. I'd had no peace at breakfast, everything seemed more difficult than it ought, and I felt that my efforts were being undervalued... you get the picture. It was probably just me. When we boarded the Red Arrow bus to Nottingham my complimentary copy of The Times (if you don't mind) reported that the day was almost a sellout and that we'd be lucky to get in. Great, thanks. No, really.
I rang Trent Bridge from Nottingham City Centre, and they said they had tickets left, at a cost of £35. Each. We charged down to the ground, avoiding scalpers and touts by the dozen. When we finally made it to the ticket office, the keenest tout in the universe almost carried us to the gates, showed the £55 tickets to the bloke on the door to prove that they were kosher, and offered them to me for £55 for two. I ended up giving him £40 and we were in. I was patting myself on the back when I realised that there was one thing I hadn't checked. That's right, the seats weren't together. Oh well, such is life. We weren't far from each other, and the seats were good, not to mention the saving of 70 quid on the total cost. The people around us were chatty and pleasant, and we got together at lunch and at tea. After the tea interval I bought Lynn down to where I was sitting, as there were two seats that had been vacant the whole time. It was a great day's cricket, and it is unlikely that I will get to Trent Bridge again anytime soon. We saw Jimmy Anderson, Stuart Broad and Steve Finn all bowl long spells, and Graham Swann bowled a few overs too. We saw 12 wickets fall in the day, the weather was good, and we can now add Trent Bridge to our sporting highlights album.

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