we are a cricket loving family. i grew up watching cricket with my brother and father. cheering loudly at every ball. marveling at how my brother remembered the stats from matches long gone by. i am more the french definition of ‘sportif’… i actively watch sports.

then i got married, into another cricket loving family… and my husband plays cricket every sat and sun, even after we got married (yes, this is one of my big grouses!)

when the trip to london came up 2 years ago, it was obvious that we would visit lords. it is the mecca of cricket, THE place for it all… i remember my friend telling me her brother had laid down on the ground and kissed the pitch on his first visit there. well, that kind of explained how we felt too…

only 2 days to go before we went off to greece, we decided it was THE day to check out lords. they have the tours which i thought was too expensive once converted into INR but for my cricket-loving husband, there was no talk of expense.. it was something one did, period.

we were late. the morning had begun in sluggish fashion. london summers, were our bombay winters. and in winter, you are sluggish. so while all the londoners are zippy, and up to seek the sun. we were cold and wanted to laze around. but anyway, i digress…

we left late. but we had it all mapped out, and had asked my brother for accurate directions. so we walked with real speed to the tube station. went to the right platform, caught the right train. phew…

we could make it, but it was tight. and, we hadn’t booked the tour in advance. well, i had called them the previous day, but no one answered the phone. we thought even if we don’t catch the tour, we could atleast see the grounds.

we reached st. johns wood station with minutes to spare. lords was more than a km away, so we knew we had to run. and run fast. that was the longest km ever. we ran, huffing and puffing, bags dashing against shoulders. his day bag, my heavy camera bag. but we ended up at the wrong gate and had to run, again…

there was no one at the gate, no people trying to get in. it was quiet and almost deserted. we asked the security guard who slowly walked towards us about the tour, he looked at us and said, “there will be no tour as there is a match on.”

we begged. pleaded.
“just a peep?” “we’ve come all the way from india, and won’t come back.”

silence. and then a stiff shake of the head and a no. and he walked away from the gate.

like little kids we stood by the gate, and peeped in through the bars. then with no choice we turned and walked away. and london being london, it started raining just then…

have you ever had a flop show? leave a comment with the story 😀