da spicy bet： We were promised demonstrations on the first day of the first Test againstZimbabwe at Lord’s, but the only scowls on the way down to the ground fromthe tube station were on the faces of the touts, who must have caught a coldon a match where
Steven Lynch at Lord's22-May-2003We were promised demonstrations on the first day of the first Test againstZimbabwe at Lord’s, but the only scowls on the way down to the ground fromthe tube station were on the faces of the touts, who must have caught a coldon a match where tickets were readily available at the normal price anyway.
A female protestor is escorted from the field
The overcast weather put a dampener on the start, and the demos too. Theobjectors turned out to be encamped near the Grace Gate: a chilly-lookingopen-top bus went up and down St John’s Wood Road, while on the pavementabout 50 hardy placard-wavers were shepherded away from the entrances. A mandressed in whites daubed with tomato ketchup vied with Peter Tatchell as thefocus of media attention.One banner compared Tim Lamb, the ECB chief executive, with Lord Haw-Haw,the Second World War German mouthpiece. The others were less original, and youcouldn’t help thinking that the splintered nature of the various protestgroups didn’t exactly help their overall cohesion. But they made theirpoint, peacefully too.Inside the ground there was a more obvious security presence than normal,including some imposing military uniforms. They couldn’t stop onewell-dressed lady marching on to the pitch, brandishing a banner saying”Bowl Out Killer Mugabe”. The Zimbabwean fielders examined their fingernailsin studied fashion as she was politely escorted off.After lunch another man strolled on, to be encircled by a phalanx of men inbibs. He came quietly too, and England’s openers returned to the task ofcombatting the moving ball. There weren’t too many black armbands to be seenin the crowd, especially not in the pavilion. There weren’t too many arms tobe seen there, actually, as the few members who had turned up resolutelykept their jackets on in the cold.Elsewhere the crowd was smaller than usual, literally. Younger, too – alarge number of school parties meant the applause was loud and shrill,bringing to mind those old women’s hockey internationals at Wembley, whenthe noise was like a Beatles concert without the bonus of the music. Onejournalist, surveying the scene from the Lord’s media gherkin, pronounced:”There are more children here than people.” Well, we know what he meant.With the demonstrations, like the morning, proving a bit of a damp squib,the press moved on to weightier matters. Well, wetter matters,anyway. Why was the pale-blue carpet in the media centre damp? It turned outthat a recent shampoo hadn’t quite set, and sudsy white stuff was seepinginto many a scribe’s shoe. Brian Johnston, whose famous co-respondentfootwear was a feature of many a Lord’s Test, wouldn’t have been impressed.Steven Lynch is editor of Wisden CricInfo.