Day three
Whilst I do not possesses the cricket expertise of Duggie Heath and Tom Hollingworth, it is obvious even to me that today England will today have a mountain to climb. India can bat till lunchtime, have a lead of 250 runs and 4 sessions to bowl out England. If Root can extract turn on this wicket, one fears for England what Ashwin will do.
After breakfast, I decided to stroll along Marine Drive to the ground. Early morning in a slight mist the skyscrapers appear on the shoreline. Joggers are out but it’s mainly cricket fans making their way the stadium. There were nearly 20,000 of them in the stadium nearly 2/3 rds full. We were rewarded by a fine century by Vitaj Kohli. Keeper Barstow missed a stumping and I asked Duggie why. He informed that these days technical keeping is not enough, you need to bat and Bairstow is one of our best batters though there are better glove-men. I saw one Indian bodily painted in front of the box in the colours of the Indian flag in front of our box. He has not missed any of the last 57 tests and is a massive Tendulkar fan.
We have two boxes for celebrity groups A and B. There was an incident on the first day when Antony adjusted the fan, twice incurring the wrath of one couple. He has now crossed the floor to B Box. Although he has been referred to as the man-you-love-to-hate, my odium is directed at a smart ass who would come on the coach and say “Come on everybody, cheer up!”. He had the gall to contradict me over my comment on the lack of interiors in the chateaux on the Loire and I had no other alternative than to dress him down publicly. I have feeling he is a management consultant as he seems a semi -professional know all. He was an early casualty to Delhi belly saying he was pleased to get out it out of the way. I told him that it is like falling early in the Grand National, you never get back in the race. Generally though the group is happy and humorous one, though a few others have been claimed by Delhi-belly and imodium is as valuable as gold.
In the night I have suffered from cramps in the calf muscles and to alleviate these – and I assure you only for therapeutic reasons – I booked a massage treatment. The masseuse Dum Cho hailed from Bhutan, the first person I have ever met from that country. Indeed I was not even sure where the mountainous kingdom was geographically. The highlight was when at the end she anointed me in some warm oil and proceeded to give me a head massage. My “plates of meat” had also swollen in the heat and she placed these in hot bowl with salts and then gave them a most beneficial rub.
