Bright Beer, Dull Cricket

Yorkshire 494 all out
v Sussex 493-7
close on Day 3
at Hove

Sunday 23 August 2015

Twitter @ball_sup

I love the Long Room at Hove. Those sash windows. That high wooden ceiling. Clean & modern fixtures & fittings in an old building. Pennants, pictures. Proper Club Stewards. That neat little bar in the corner.

Harveys Sussex Best Bitter, gravity cask on the bar at 4%. Although I think that is probably Bright Beer. Bit of a cheat right there. Bright Beer has had the yeast sediment removed and been decanted into a new cask. Strictly NOT REAL ALE. One point deducted.

Anyway, I had Arundel Brewery, Sussex Gold at 4.2%. From a handpull. Lovely & refreshing. A proper cricket ale in a proper cricket Long Room.

The strip was way over our side. The boundary looked very short. There was some substantial rain in the morning. But, as is the way, good covers, good drainage, efficient mopping up - and we’re underway. Only 3 wickets in the (truncated) day. Maxwell & Leaning in the attack. Tons for Michael Yardy & Ben Brown (red ink 106 off 91 balls). Not really poor body language from the Yorkshire Lads. Just, we’re not going to get this done body language.

I am a realist fan of Series & Season cricket. You’re not gonna get it all done all the time. If you need to draw a game (Nagpur) to take the Series, get it done, move on. But, you get seduced by the juggernaut that is this Yorkshire team. So, a perfectly acceptable, but slow, nothing happening day, seems out-of-character.

191/397