1. All the drama off the cricket field. The day before the match Pakistan Cricket Board Chairman Butt was reported to have told India's NDTV channel: "There is loud and clear talk in bookie circles that some English players were paid enormous amounts of money to lose. No wonder there was total collapse of the English side." He said that about the previous ODI match on Friday, where England lost a dramatic match to some great bowling, namely by Umar Gul who spun his way to victory. The allegations had the England team hurt, outraged and completely jaded about playing cricket with Pakistan. I think they'll be very glad when this series is over.
2. Due to the drama, the match was very close to not going ahead at all. I was checking the BBC sport homepage every fifteen minutes just waiting for the report to come up that the match had been cancelled. When I got to Lord's and the teams came out, the sun was shining and the cheers were ringing, that was enough for me to feel happy. Despite the loss, just being there and enjoying the game in its purity (please no more match fixing - who are these people? What gives them the right? Who do they think they are?) was enough for me. Plus Stuart Broad was fielding for a long time right in front of me. Yum yum.
3. Ok, Stuart Broad can be a reason all of his own. I say again, Yum. Check out the picture ^^^ (I like to think he was waving only at me :-D)
4. I had a dream the night before that the guy I ended up sitting next to (it was bound to be a guy) spilt a full pint in my lap and was generally a complete idiot. I feared he'd be an awful boat shoe wearing preppy rah rah idiot. Sure enough when I got to my seat I was on the isle (a good thing - I am not a window seat person. When they give the choice on the plane I'm everyone's dream companion because I want that isle seat. I like to have the freedom to jump up and down. I like to get up and walk.) and next to me were two big burly looking guys. They didn't look preppy but I was still wary. Nothing was said for the first twenty minutes or so until I took a sandwich out of my bag and the guy closest to me said 'I hope you've got enough in that bag for all three of us' and smiled a great big smile at me. From there on in I knew it was going to be a good day. Chris and Matt turned out to be golf pros, which is pretty cool in itself, and good good guys, which is very cool. They were offering to buy me drinks, said they'd streak with me to get Broad's attention, all in all they were excellently pleasant company. If you ever want a golf lesson with a good guy go to the Golf Pro shop/course in Richmond and ask for Matt. (Sorry Chris but I can't remember where you work...)
5. England lost the toss and Pakistan chose to bat first. This afforded them a huge advantage as the sun was shining and visibility was perfect on a batters field. When England came to bat the sun was going down and those pesky twilight hours proved to be England's downfall as Bell, Collingwood, Strauss, Yardy and Bresnan all found it very hard to even see the ball, let alone read it. What had been a batters pitch soon turned into a bowlers as Pakistan got the ball moving notably more than England had been able to, despite Swann's magnificent 4-37, and were bowled out for 227 in 46.1 overs, 38 runs short. That means the series is level at 2-2 and tomorrow's match at The Rose Bowl in Southampton will be the decider. That's kind of exciting.
6. My Dad came along after work and watched England's innings with me, which was lovely. He was a bit peeved at how much he still had to pay considering he'd missed half the game but I think he had a good time anyway. I hope he did. And we saw one of the oldest tracks in London at Baker Street tube station which was exciting (for an architect and an architect's daughter).
So yes, we lost, but was it still worth going? Most definitely. There's nothing like live sport. I looked up at the press centre (you know, the big alien bubble - cool looking pod thing) and got chills at the thought that one day I might be in there. Very very cool.
I'll keep you blogged...
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