Mum would have loved that World Cup, and the colour it brought to The Oval

THE CRICKETER'S MOMENTS OF 2019 - HUW TURBERVILL: I'd had my last meaningful conversation with her by that day. I couldn't tell her I was at The Oval, where we’d been so many times together. She would have been thrilled

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I vowed to keep it together. But then... a lad of about 12 emerged out of the Tube, with his mum. They were going where I was. To The Oval. Australia v Sri Lanka. And I welled up.

What a time to (nearly) lose the plot. It was my first match reporting at the eagerly awaited World Cup. We’d talked about the competition for months at The Cricketer. It was the biggest of summers – with the Ashes to come. Massive for the magazine, and our website.

My mother, Hazel, was still with us (just). She was gravely ill all year and finally lost her brave battle in August. But I’d had my last meaningful conversation with her by that day. I couldn’t tell her I was at The Oval, where we’d been so many times together. She would have been thrilled. Especially as it was Australia.

We both secretly loved those rapscallion Aussies. AB – Captain Grumpy, and Ned Kelly, as Chappelli called him in 1987; Big Merv the Swerve, a cross between The Terminator and the Village People, frighteningly funny; and Warnie, the champagne-spurting larrikin, to name just a few. 

We had a particularly memorable afternoon in the Peter May Stand in 1989, as a p***ed-up Aussie ribbed all and sundry. Mum was a nurse, an English lady. As her cousin Derek, who now lives in Perth, told me at her passing, “She was simply a beautiful person who, in my mind, personifies the best of English people. With so much divisiveness in Britain now, she would have shone as a prime example of English goodness.” What did she make of the fan that day 30 years ago? We laughed and winced in equal measure!

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Action from Sri Lanka against Australia at The Oval during the World Cup

It was not just Australian cricket though. It was everything about cricket at The Oval. We adored our trips there. We also caught the train from Suffolk to watch the New Zealanders in 1986; a Javed Miandad masterclass in 1987; the ‘Ian Botham could not quite get his leg over’ Test in 1991 (after a brief dalliance with Lord’s); the Wasim/Waqar Show in 1992; Mike Atherton’s first win as skipper in 1993 (she’d offered to give up her ticket to a girlfriend I was seeing at the time. Thank goodness I turned her down); and finally the despair of watching our Sussex hero Alan Wells push his first ball in Test cricket into the hands of short-leg off Curtly Ambrose in 1994.

In homage to her, I made sure I thoroughly enjoyed this match. Aaron Finch’s innings was mighty. He was wonderfully self-deprecating in the press conference – an antidote to the bullish characters who have led Australia in the past (not that I didn’t enjoy all that nonsense of course!). “Australia have a history of larger-than-life characters,” observed a Sri Lankan reporter… “Makes me sound pretty boring,” Finch replied.

Sri Lanka – a name I find almost impossible to say without hearing it in the voice of Billy Birmingham’s Tony Greig – did give the Australians a scare. Their best batsmen, Dimuth Karunaratne – the captain – and Kusal Perera scoring 97 and 52 respectively. Then they petered out though, World Cup destroyer Mitchell Starc strangling them.

The Sri Lankan whinging also made a good subplot. Manager Ashantha de Mel bemoaned the green pitches, the training facilities and accommodation, the lack of a swimming pool – even their bus was cramped. They refused to attend the press conference. The toys had well and truly come out of the pram.

It was a good World Cup. New Zealand’s win over Bangladesh, again at The Oval, stands in my mind. The ground has never looked so gorgeous, the tournament’s distinctive colours draped over the pavilion, bathed in floodlight. Lord’s also hosted some memorable occasions – including, of course, that stunning final that piqued the interest of the most casual cricket fans. Mum would have enjoyed the World Cup.

I owe my love of cricket partially to her.  On one of our last trips out together, last spring, we bumped into one of our heroes, a charming Graham Gooch, on the beach at Southwold. A poignant moment, to say the least.

And now I have tried to pass my love of cricket on to my children. 

Frankly we owe it to this bloody brilliant game of ours.

OTHER MOMENTS OF 2019

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