Judith Lacy's Jottings: Cricket on free-to-air TV is the best thing since ...

Sir Richard Hadlee and Martin Crowe, two of New Zealand's greatest cricketers, and who I grew up following. Photo / NZME

OPINION

International cricket on free-to-air TV is the best thing since Martin Crowe.

And domestic T20 cricket on free-to-air TV is the best thing since Daniel Vettori.

I didn’t realise how much I missed watching cricket until I tuned in to the Super Smash on Duke and New Zealand taking on Pakistan in the T20 internationals on TVNZ 1.

It was like going from gruel to an 11-course degustation menu, with the fast-food version of cricket meaning my brain hadn’t had time to process one wicket or boundary when something else momentous happened.

But what I soon realised I’d missed the most was the language of cricket. For 6th form English we had to do an assignment on the language of a specialist topic and I chose ... you guessed correctly.

I don’t remember what topics my classmates chose, but I do remember my choice caused a few ripples. But how could I go past cow corner, googly, rib-tickler and — dare I confess — box.

Cricketers can do everything I can’t — hand-eye co-ordination, catch a ball and run.

I did try, though. Cricket on the farm at Pātea was great because we had a substantial macrocarpa hedge for the wicketkeeper. When I was bowling I would call myself Helen Hadlee, and was dismayed to later learn the bowling great’s wife was called Karen, not Helen. Hitting a six was frustrating for the bowler, not just for the boost to the batter’s runs tally, but because you had to go find the ball in the paddock, often atop a cow pat.

Cricket is also a thinking person’s game packed with characters (and not just the players — think umpire Billy Bowden and commentator Henry Blofeld), folklore and fascinating statistics — yes, there is such a thing.

The technology and analysis associated with cricket have come a long way since the 1980s, when I would sit on the bank at Pukekura Park in New Plymouth watching Central Districts.

It was there I lined up to get Crowe’s autograph, only to have the spine of the book give way and the pages tumble to the ground.

I was working near the Basin Reserve on February 4, 1991, when Crowe was heading towards being the first New Zealander to make 300 runs. I had just made it home to Karori to watch the magic on TV when he got out for 299. My flatmates thought I had hurt myself, so loud were my cries of anguish.

I received my cricket education from listening to Bryan Waddle and Jeremy Coney. It’s hard to believe Waddle is 76 and Coney 71. Time flies faster than Lockie Ferguson and Shane Bond combined.

In one newsroom I worked in, the men would gather around the TV pontificating on the action. One day a male colleague walked up, realised he had missed something and asked what had happened. When I replied it was obvious he didn’t believe me, so he asked another (male) colleague who repeated what I had said. Howzat for sexism.

I’m gradually building my knowledge of the female cricketers. It’s fantastic, the women and men’s domestic T20 teams are getting equal TV coverage. Female commentators and umpires were unheard of when I was a teen.

What says summer more than cricket — the sound of bat on ball, green grass, blue sky?

And when I began to find my company lacking over the break, I could turn on the TV and be transported to the greatest sport of all.

My couch is calling. As 10cc sang, I don’t like cricket, I love it.

Read more from Judith Lacy here.