That's Entertainment???

Fireworks on pitch
By Pantherlike
February 13 2014

Pantherlike reports on the jamboree of last rites of England's Ashes Horrobullis. We hear of bouncers ( not the cricket type) , big hits ( again not cricket wise) and a little about the cricket. This report carries a MTWD health warning for those who don't like 20/20.

Now those that read my last posting that summarised the Aussies’ breezy win in the ODI at the SCG will recount how I had been successful in Dougie’s impromptu raffling of what turned out to be two tickets to the T20 at the Olympic Arena. And so it was that I made my way along to Olympic Park along with a mate from my local team making his T20 debut.

For those who have witnessed the glorious spectacle that is T20 cricket, one will be familiar with the razzamatazz, the continuous interjections from announcers, entertainers, crowd-celebrities etc etc and etc! This game was no different. First there was the crowd, and what a crowd it was. One would be forgiven for attempting to contextualise the evening’s event into cricketing terms: it was a dead rubber starting at 8pm on a Sunday night and at Homebush; hardly the choicest venue for cricket with it’s absurdly short straight hits; it’s unnecessarily wide flanks and seating that has one at all sorts of interesting angles; well, it was purpose-built for track and field where the action is spread right across the playing field, rather than concentrated in the middle! Yet they all came, a good 45,000 thousand of them – all (well except us and a few others I suppose) paid good money on tickets, parking and the like to come along and be ENTERTAINED!

But this is T20 and one needs to understand the necessity in leaving one’s cricket brain AT HOME! And so it was that John (me mate) and I took our seats on one of those wide flanks, reserve seating mind you (Cricket NSW had done alright by us…) to watch the spectacle. We’d hardly settled in before we were amazed at the display.

First there were trampolinists right in front of us, though at ground level. Two in yellow, nay Aussie Gold, jump suits and two in er, red. That clearly meant that there was a pair of performers to provide visualise clues to the crowd that the Aussies had done something to merit applause and the two red acrobatists to get a run if the English managed to do something, well, applause-worthy, at any time during the evening.

The trampolinists were in full swing, it was tremendous to see them leaping high into the evening sky with all the commitment and concentration of trained professionals. Not far away was one of a regular set of cheer leaders, young lasses with choreographed moves so well-rehearsed you’d think that they did little else. In the crowd just to our left was a platform where several young lads were doing various interpretations of break, rap, funk and whatever else one calls that sort of dance. All before an boisterous crowd, energised by constant air paly of well-known hits of yesterday – amazing how often Queen’s We Will Rock You kept coming round on the turnstile! It led me to remark at one stage to John if Roger Taylor knew what he was doing all those years ago?? Well, yes is the only answer to that question. And all this before the game had even started!

There was red carpet laid out to welcome the two sides; the Aussies assuming full authority and batting first. Most likely a gentlemen’s agreement between all concerned, the organisers would’ve been fearful of an English collapse leading to an early night and depriving the TV stations of valuable advertising income…and so it was the Finch and White came out to set the game, the crowd, indeed the adjacent southern hemisphere ALIGHT!

John and I were under no delusions of the quality of match unfolding before us. We nattered about this and that, recalled some days at the SCG when the combatants whore WHITE and just generally caught up. Might as well have been a day of shield cricket, as the mind become more and more desensitised to the contant barrage of boundaries, trampolinists, wickets, fire throwing machines, also in team colours depending on whose side had caused the event in the match to be AWESOME etc etc etc…

We found the convenience of getting the drinks during the innings as the 45,000 strong crowd were held mesmerised by themselves and their constant incredulity at how they could remain switched ON.

John and I chuckled as the crowd made for it during the ‘break in play’, normally referred to as the ‘innings break’ to get more drinks, food, energy – anything – to ensure that they could continue to revel into the night.

We marvelled at how young children, no doubt with proud parents looking on, were crowd surfed up the stands on inflatable pool lilos (an utterly flabbergasting sight!), how the constant Mexican waves continued to be started up anytime the game got boring if there’d been an unusual run of a couple of dot balls, or there’d been a few singles taken, you know, the sort of on-field rot destined to lead to existential torpor and woe…but would just blow up more of those inflatable beach balls that get mindlessly bounced around the crowd until someone upsets the apple cart and it lands on the field of play only to be confiscated by one of army of humourless security personnel to the onset of universal booing and heckling.

The night wore on in this vein without even looking like letting up. The Aussies had battered there innings well and truly and 190-odd was also going to look safe. As English wickets fell leading to even higher states of delirium in the stands, John and I noticed that it was getting late and with a couple of wickets left to record the inevitable crushing win decided to beat the mad throng to the carpark.

The cricket you ask? Yes, there was a game played. Finch didn’t last long. White did, got a few. Bailey looked astonishingly brilliant for 49 in what must’ve been three or four overs. Commentators must have a hell of a time organising the superlatives in their brains – the constant cacophony of ‘great’ and ‘awesome’ and ‘incredible’ must surely grate on the home viewer. For England, Moggy was the only pom who even looked like making a fist of the chase – his 34 was one of assured competence. But really the whole night just had an air of the ‘thank the almighty that this is the last game before we can all just pack up and go home and pretend this godawful tour never happened!’ about it.

But the really winner on the night was the crowd who beat to their own drum of excitement filled revelry, the game no poorer for such an exhibition but one’s constantly left wondering as to the point of it all…