No effort Blag

England 400 all out
v India 451-7
close on Day 3

Saturday 10 December 2016

Played at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai

Twitter @ball_sup

19 Indian Beer Ticks. Same as yesterday. Although, I did have a beer. Only in the ground nonetheless!!! But, I ain't ticking it. As it was a tin of BUDWEISER. Read. That. Again. Budweiser.

We did a superb no effort required Blag today. I picked our seats in the Tendulkar Lower on the back row. I thought I might get whatever shade there was up there, rather than further forward. Sure enough. You've got the full whack Sun until the first drinks break. By Lunch, your head is in the shade. And, it gets better.

And, remember never to ask the Carrier Bag Firm “will the Sun move behind that stand later?”. No, it fucking will not. There's been some changes. The Sun stays where it is. It's the Earth that moves.

Any road up. The Tendulkar Lower….. So, our back row seats had the glass window of a Hospitality Box right behind. As I needed an amount of wriggling to deal with my sweat drenched shirt, I was constantly up n down. Ditto, excuse me, pardon me, mind these eggs along the row as my over hydrated body system frequently needed the Loo.

All of which meant I was a frequent waver & apologiser to our fellow travellers in the Hospitality Box. Eventually, the fella whose Box it was gave the universal set of signals & gesticulations for “you & Mrs Ball Sup come round the back & I'll let you in”. Which we did. Ooohhh & it came to pass that the Air Conditioning was very welcome indeed.

Lovely fella. Listened to my chat & banter. Pressed bottles of water. And some sandwiches. And a cup of coffee on us. I'm a dab hand at glad handing. In my element. Best plan. Say yes please to everything. Avoids offence. Even if it is a tin of Budweiser. Tasting notes. See yesterday re Kingfisher.

I'll pay it forward as well. Because he gave me tickets for Day 4.

So, we survived Kohli Day. Although he's still there. Meaning we're back on tomorrow. Steve Pujara went to the second ball of the day. Left an absolute belter nip backer from Jake Ball. Long old Kohli Day from there. Verbally, I've given him the LOT. I've never met the bloke. But, I reckon he's alright. It's just the palaver that surrounds him. The fella is at the absolute top of his game. And, got the stats to back that up. I'm happy that he walks amongst us. India got what they deserved for playing positively.

Our bowlers did OK in trying circumstances. But, we just don't have the penetration. We're not constantly at it. And some created chances went down. And some reviews were wasted.

414/851