November 22, 2001

'The day I made it'

- Jonathan Dyson

Nasser Hussain will remember it as the fulfillment of his father's dream for his son to play cricket for England in the country of his birth. Craig White will recall it as the day he smashed 24 in an over. Richard Dawson will mark it down as a successful England debut.

For Jonathan Dyson, cricket fan from Yorkshire, England, the recent two-day game between an MCA President's XI and an England XI in Mumbai will be remembered as his first ever England game overseas, and perhaps, more significantly, his first ever England warm-up match.

All cricketers have personal landmarks - their first century, their first five-for, their first Test win. Often a player will look back on his career and say "that was the day I made it". Fans have exactly the same pointers.

Getting up at 3.30 am, and dragging my duvet downstairs to watch the World Cup final in 1987 between England and Australia is my first memory as an England fan. The following year, against the West Indies at Headingley, I saw both my first Test and my first one-day international. In 1992 at the same venue against Pakistan, I watched my first entire Test match. And now, in 2001, the biggest ambition of all has been realised.

Of course for the players, warm-up matches aren't especially important - the results don't really matter. They are all about preparation, acclimatisation, concentration. Are the feet moving properly? Is the ball coming out right? Will I be picked for the Tests?

Yet in a sense, for fans, warm-up matches have a far greater significance. They are a sign of a real commitment to your team, and your first one shows that you've really "made it" as a big fan. Being there shows that you are not only keen to watch your team overseas, but that you are willing to follow their progress intimately, to observe their preparations for the Test series as well as the Tests themselves.

It is all to do with the fact that following a sports team is more than anything about ups and downs. When your team finally wins a game after a long barren patch, and you know that you've been sticking by them through thick and thin, the feeling of satisfaction is that much stronger. I found watching England's game in Mumbai a strange experience, for I was watching batsmen that I would normally be praying not to be dismissed, and bowlers whose every poor ball I would normally curse.

Now, instead, I sat back in my seat, not cheering or agonising or fuming, but simply observing. And as I watched the England batsman cream the MCA attack to all parts on Monday, I found that watching England in warm-up matches is in some ways more pleasureable than watching them in the Tests. Not only are they more successful, but there is far less stress for the fan, and overall it is a far more relaxing experience. I also felt a sense of preparing myself along with the players. Obviously, playing cricket in India is a far more arduous task than watching it. But in many ways, fans need to acclimatise as well. And apart from a raspberry lolly that unforunately came out the wrong end quite quickly, and almost trgically made me miss White's onslaught, I came through my first match in India OK. Yet more important than all of this, is the fact that I was there. For now I know that, if England do upset the odds and manage to win the series, I will be enjoying the extra satisfaction of knowing that I had been with them, right from the start.

GE Features

Earlier Diaries:
- A Backpacker's Diary
- Bowled over by the great Bedi
- Agonising uncertainty!
- India, not Lord's, is the mecca of cricket

Mail Jonathan Dyson

Illustration: Bijoy Venugopal