Look At The Harlequins! (Leicestershire v Middlesex)

Leicestershire v Middlesex, Grace Road, CB40, Sunday 20th May 2012

I’m surprised that no-one seems to have thought of including some footage of the John Player League in the current glut of programmes about the 1970s.  Funded by fags and dependant for its popularity on being a way to circumvent the Sunday licensing laws (where else could you spend all afternoon drinking Double Diamond from a dimpled tankard while getting stuck into a carton of complimentary JPS?) it seems to me as of its time as Choppers and Vic Feather.

But times change and – as of this season – smoking has now been banned from all the seated areas at Grace Road (apparently in response to requests from the Members). The 40 over game persists, though the Merchants of Death have been replaced as sponsors by a Bank.  A couple of seasons ago it had appeared doomed, used like grouting to plug gaps in the schedules (I think I remember seeing one on a Tuesday morning), but has now been restored – mostly – to Sunday afternoons.  I don’t know how seriously anyone takes it as a sporting contest, but – rather like one-day internationals – it generates income and provides a fun day out for all the family.

I’m not even sure how seriously the Counties take it (can anyone other than supporters of that County remember who won it last year?) .  Nor does it help that Leicestershire seem to be so puzzlingly bad at it (last year they won 2 out of 12 matches, and this season they’ve  lost 3, with 1 abandoned) so there isn’t generally much mystery about the likely result at Grace Road.  

What tends to stick in the mind, though, are individual performances  – from Jason Roy and Ben Stokes last season, for instance – and it does give those of us who usually watch Second Division cricket a chance to gawp at a few stars.  Although this  is hardly on a par with queueing up behind Gary Sobers to buy an ice-cream in the old days, Sunday’s main attractions were Steve Finn and Eion Morgan (arms folded, wearing no.7 in the middle of this group). 

Morgan was making his first appearance on a cricket field since February, since when he has trousered vast sums for not appearing in the Indian Premier League.  When he batted, in the course of an unspectacular but untroubled innings by Middlesex, he managed a couple of his trademark reverse sweeps – like a slightly out-of-practice three card trick merchant – before falling victim to Josh Cobb, whose mystery spin must have brought back troubling memories of Saeed Ajmal.  Perhaps.

When Leicestershire replied, Cobb did manage, as usual, to lift the ball over the ring, but only as far as the one fieldsman outside the ring.  Finn then – in murky light – removed in short order Sarwan, Boyce and Smith.  But when you’re facing the fastest bowler in county cricket in dim light I wonder if you see the ball very clearly. I wonder if you see the ball at all?

During his spell at the IPL, Morgan would, of course, have become used to a certain amount of razamattaz – music, dancing girls and so on.  We did our best to smooth his passage back into the domestic season by arranging a performance by the Wigston Enterprise Brass Band in the tea interval.    

Morgan did essay a brief shimmy to ‘Hey Jude’, but it was Finn who seemed most affected, being inspired to a demonstration of interpretative dancing before taking the field.  

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Perhaps we really shouldn’t have provoked him.

MaxiMuscle v Bakewell Tarts

In the run up to the Test series against Pakistan the lofty young England fast bowlers Stuart Broad and Steven Finn seem to have been made available to the press for interviews, on their return from the “strength and conditioning programme” they have been subjected to by the ECB.  There has been some speculation as to what this involved.  I suspected that it was plenty of Bed Rest, an intensive course of Beef Tea, and, perhaps, a dose of the old Monkey Glands.  But I think these probing interviews have helped to clear the matter up.

In the interview in Sport Magazine (as given away at London railway stations) Stuart Broad shares his diet tips.  For breakfast it’s beans and scrambled egg on toast.  At lunchtime he is “looking for some sort of protein” and so “I normally get a protein shake just before I go out” (no shepherd’s pie for him).  At tea a note of wistfulness enters his voice – “At league cricket, you used to get a full tea – bakewell tarts and everything.  But now it’s a protein shake, a yoghurt and a banana … it’s not one to look forward to anymore.  It used to be lovely, but it’s a bit more basic now.  No sandwiches or anything.”  In the evening it’s off to a Japanese restaurant.

In the Wisden Cricketer, he gives a slightly different account.  He apparently also has a protein shake and a couple of bananas before going on the pitch.  For tea, again, it’s a protein shake, but immediately after the game he has a Maxi-milk, “which helps repair muscles and gives you the protein you need.  I live off Maxi-milk during the day.”   

The interview in The Guardian  – “Broad back to give England more muscle” is silent on the subject of protein shakes, but I think the italicised note at the end gives us a clue what the game is here – “Stuart Broad uses Maximuscle, Europe’s leading sports nutrition brand to maximise his sporting performance.  See maximuscle.com”.  I see, from the interview in the WC, that Steven Finn also “uses Maximuscle” etc.

So that’s what they’ve been up to. 

Maxi-Milk itself seems relatively benign, but, looking through the full range of MaxiMuscle products (the name sounds to me a little like one of the creations of the notoriously unreliable Acme Corporation) – Maximuscle.com – I do hope they don’t get carried away.

There is no firm scientific evidence for this – and I’m sure it isn’t true of any of the products of MaxiMuscle – but there have been allegations that the excessive use of creatine, for instance, can lead to outbreaks of acne, baldness, body odour and violent mood swings.  This might not affect young Broad’s bowling adversely, but it wouldn’t do a great deal for his advertising endorsements or his disciplinary record.