I couldn't help but notice that Mark Church was asking for our memories of the first Surrey game we attended, and that got me casting my mind back to 2007 when the first RAGM (Rampant Annual General Meeting) took place. It was the first time I was able to put faces to a lot of the names that I had come to know during the hinderend of 2006. It was a double challenge for me, in that my agoraphobic tendancies usually stopped me from going anywhere as far as London, but it was something I felt strongly that I had to attempt. And so, with a lot of help from friends, it came to pass that on the last day of the last championship match that year, I attended my first ever game of cricket! It started a rather irritating trend of my travelling down on the train to London on the day that Mr Ramprakash scored a ton! To this day I still haven't seen a Ramps century!
Anyhow, I've dug out my notes from that day and editted them down, just so that I can record them here for posterity.
I arrived at the Oval at about 09.30, mostly because everyone else was meeting up the station and I hadn't a clue what was being arranged. Better to get there early and wait. It was not such a bad idea: I got there in time to see the traditional pre-match football kick-about between the Surrey boys. Yep, there was Ramps and Butch…Newman falling over. Batty running to retrieve the ball from the other side of the ground. Alan Butcher striding imperiously amidst his players. A look up at the sky revealed a few clouds but there was a vague warmth to the day, so it looked as if we might get away without the predicted rain causing too many problems.
I took a picture of the famous gasometer - just to prove that I was there. I still couldn't believe it.
A brief mention then of the situation from a cricket point of view. It was day four of four, and Surrey had spent the last three days tonking Lancashire all over the pitch, which was good if like me you were a Surrey supporter. If you weren't and you wanted Lancs to win the title (which they could possibly have done if they'd manage to pull off a miracle bigger than Craig Revel Horwood declaring Quentin Wilson the world's greatest dancer) then you'd have been casting an eye towards the Sussex match to see what was happening there. Sussex had looked like they were going to win their game, which would have put them above Durham. Then the world's attention would the assuredly turn to the Oval, because if Lancs won the game they would have been victorious outright county champions for the first time in 76 years. If Surrey beat Lancs then Sussex would be the champs.
Whilst I agreed that it would be nice for Lancs to win after such a long gap it seemed to me that Sussex had probably played better and won more games than Lancs overall, so the result should in fairness have gone to the best team that year. Besides, I had come to see Surrey win a game, and with that in mind resolutely decided to applaud every single catch from the home team, and stifle the impulse to laugh childishly every time a Lancs batsman was dismissed. If Lancs were good enough to chase down the massive target set largely by Ramps then they deserved to win, and so be it.
The Rampant hordes descended upon the Oval shortly after, to wreak their own special brand of havoc, armed with munchies and copious amounts of gin! We chose our spot, and with the game already underway seated ourselves spread out over two rows not far from the front of one of the stands. Moments after, Jean decided to wear her gin and tonic rather than drink it, captured for posterity by the camera of yours truly! Fiona promptly started passing around the gin, asking politely if anyone else would care to indulge themselves. Now, I'm as near to tea-total as you can get: the first and last time I had gin was about ten years ago. On that occasion I couldn't walk down the path to the car without staggering (as well for everyone that I don’t drive)! Still, I thought, what the heck and took Fi up on her offer, and proceeded to knock back a huge mouthful of neat gin much to the amusement of all who witnessed it!
So there we were, chattering and laughing, listening to Churchy and applauding the action where appropriate. The grounds weren't exactly packed. I have to admit that I thought there would be more people there for the dénouement at the Oval given how much was at stake. There weren't too many Surrey fans as far as I could tell, but a reasonable smattering of Lancs fans started to filter in as the day went on. They seemed to bring the good weather with them, as they began to shed clothes quicker than a stripogram after a night out on the town. Especially noticeable was the loud guy in the stand who kept standing up shouting "Oh, Lanky Lanky" to the tune of the hokey kokey. It got a bit annoying after the third time or so…and by the fiftieth time there were definite 'herpes vibes' winging their way towards him. I believe I may have threatened to kill him at one point. But as I'm usually such a sweet natured girl I can only attribute this to the gin.
Surrey didn't play badly at all, but Lancs clearly had their tails up and slowly, inexorably, the total began to creep downwards. Wickets would fall but so irregularly that the Lancs fans must have began to get their hopes up. As the day went on the Oval began to get a little fuller: with Lancs fans. The faithful and those who had suddenly found a renewed belief that Mark Ramprakash was not the slayer of dreams began to trickle into the grounds until the numbers in the stands began to swell. And Mr. Annoying was still there with his rallying call of "Oh, Lanky Lanky." Hmm…why didn't I send laryngitis vibes instead of herpes?
At some stage that morning we managed to lose Jean. I say lose but in truth she managed to lose us because we hadn't gone anywhere, and as the minutes ticked away we wondered if she'd somehow managed to get stuck in the ladies. Fearing something sinister had befallen Jean we kept darting looks towards the exit she had left from, only to see a rather hesitant man armed with a carrier bag coming down the steps towards us. I thought his indecisive behaviour a trifle odd but then guessed he was just looking for the best spot to sit.
Which it seemed happened to be right next to us!
Pause. "Excuse me, but are you the Rampants?" He asked us, sounding terribly hopeful.
I think we must have looked collectively shifty. I mean, it's not the sort of thing somebody tends to ask. Immediately I thought Surrey CC had decided to evict us for taking over the airwaves of BBC London with our poems and anagrams. One of us found our voice and squeaked out a cautious “yes”.
"That's a relief," said the man, "I'm Trev. Trevor Jones." He added by way of clarification.
Suddenly the collective shiftiness altered to delight and Trev was welcomed amidst the ranks, seating himself on the edge of the row next to Nic. Now, this man knows just about everything there is to know about cricket, and Surrey in particular. An author, former librarian and commentator for Surrey, Trev's inside knowledge about what had been going on in the team, added to his own witty opinions which were readily given, made interesting hearing. I don't think I've ever been so star-struck by a librarian before!
Trev seems a seriously nice man. He chatted and watched the game with us for some time, and eventually Jean finally reappeared down the steps clearly wondering who the strange man was sitting at the end of the row. Her expression on being told that it was THE Trevor Jones was priceless, and I think she was just about ready to adopt him!
Whilst Jean had been fraternising with someone whilst trying to snag some drink, Trev was kindly signing copies of his books for us. Bless the man: he had a never-ending supply! Trev mentioned that there were several OAP Lancs fans up on the balcony that looked like they had been around the last time their team had managed to win the championship, and probably - should Surrey win the game - might not last to see the dream come alive again. OK - I nearly wavered in my devotion to Surrey at that point, I admit it, but only because I didn't want to see scores of octogenarians throwing themselves off the balcony in some strange Lancastrian lemming-style suicide pact! But no…I hardened my heart to such thoughts and contented myself with sending the herpes vibes again to the noisy barsteward in the Peter May stand.
Trev disappeared shortly before lunch, I think, if I remember correctly - and promised to come back later on to watch some of the game with us. At this point texts were flying about the place between Rampants who were unable to attend the match, saying that we hadn't been spotted yet in Sky's coverage - and where were we sitting? Later on we got one from Ceci saying that she had seen us, and who was that bloke we were with, which made us laugh.
True to his word Trev returned later on in the afternoon with the game looking to swing towards Lancashire's way. Laxman was going so well that you couldn't help but feel as long as he was there the game was slipping out of Surrey's grasp. I began to get a little narked at the idea. Part of me thought Lancs deserved to win for doing so well on the last day, but to be honest when a side so dominates for three days of play, to see Surrey's (and in particular Ramps) efforts come to nothing would have been gutting for me. That was why when Laxman went having scored his 100, caught by a certain Mr. Ramprakash no less, I allowed myself a slightly childish air punch! There was a strangulated squeal of indignation a row back from Fiona (who despite her admiration for Ramps as a cricketer also doubles as a Lancashire supporter), exclaiming loudly "Damn you Ramprakash! That's it: I'm an ex-Rampant!" Thankfully, Mr R couldn't hear the threat of resignation as he was fielding just about as far away from us as he could possibly get!
It was slightly before this point four Lancs fans appeared from nowhere and, with empty seats to choose from all over the Oval, decided to sit right in front of myself and Jean! One of their number proceeded to spend the next forty or so minutes explaining the rules of cricket to his little girls. "You see, that was one run there when the batsmen ran between the wickets…" God, it could have been me half a year ago, feeling as thick as a brick.
Laxman's catch was one of two for Ramps as it turned out. Another of our other Surrey favourites Jon Batty was putting in his usual hard work and taking wickets regularly. The only question was, had they come quickly enough? The dismissal of Laxman however seemed to be the turning point in the game and some of the fire, although not the determination, had disappeared from the northern side. As they began to reach the tail of the team a feeling of slow dread crept over me. Dominic Cork was in and making progress in steady, menacing fashion.
I should at this point make some mention of the delightful 'Number 29' who entertained us for so much of the latter part of the game. This was the ever-grinning Murtaza Hussain, recruited by Surrey as a stand-in for Harbhajan Singh (who was off beating the world in the Indian 20/20 squad). Hussain was fielding in front of us quite a lot towards the end, armed with a grin like Alice's Cheshire cat! I think he - and probably the entire Surrey team - had a very good idea who we were at this point. Each time he went near the grin was switched on like a light bulb! He waved, he posed - he even wiped pretend sweat from his brow in theatrical fashion when he claimed the penultimate wicket! In the meantime Corky was still hanging around like an irritating fungal infection...
Trev disappeared at this point, leaving us to watch the game tick away. The Lancs supporters were counting the required runs down on their fingers. I was quite calm because as soon as the penultimate man had gone I felt confident the remaining batsman would likewise fall before the runs evaporated. I'm not basically a horrible person who takes delight in the misfortunes of others but - just ever so briefly - when the last wicket (Cork) fell with roughly 26 runs left to chase, rather than thinking of the poor old codgers up on the roof I took a little satisfaction in the reaction of Mr Lanky-Lanky in the stand who, as the song goes, wasn't singing anymore!
All that remained at that point was to loiter in the car park in the vain hope of spotting Ramps and his fellows. What we got instead was the rather sad sight of the heartbroken Lancs fans trailing out of the Oval. One or two - clearly the worse for drink and heartily disgruntled to boot - hung around in the car park area with the aim of harassing the umpires: not exactly the best way of rounding off the county season. Back on the field Ramps was being named man of the match, not surprisingly, and giving the obligatory interview with Sky, so it became quite clear that our chances of nabbing a quick conversation with the man himself were slight indeed. Every so often a dejected and miserable looking Lancs player would make his heavy-hearted way past us out towards the coach. Yeah, okay…I was sorry for them at this stage.
The light was beginning to fade as we posed for a group picture, and by the time we were spotted by the lovely Nicole Cutler (supporting Jon Batty presumably) and dance partner Matthew it was almost totally dark. They posed for pictures, chatted…I even managed to swallow my shyness and say a few words to Nicole! We managed to pounce on poor Churchy as he slunk by with his mobile phone, or rather Nicole did. He kindly stopped for a moment to talk as Nicole and Matt said goodbye, asking whom Nicole had been drawn as a partner in Strictly. "John Barnes," replied one of the Rampants.
"She'll not win then." Churchy deadpanned. "His knee will have fallen off after the first week…"
Churchy, like so many people I know, hates having his photo taken. This was a pity as we intended to snap away regardless, so the poor man caught sight of a half-dressed James Benning hiding his white legging-clad thighs behind the shirt he'd just got from his car, and pulled him into the photo! Benning to his credit didn't seem remotely perturbed. Neither did Jade Dernbach earlier when he'd stopped by, but considering JD had been nominated by Jon Batty as the vainest member of the Surrey team this hardly seems surprising! Churchy needlessly apologised for not being able to come down and speak to us, but it would have been an interesting trick if he could have done it considering he was broadcasting at the time!
We let Churchy go, and then shortly afterwards were asked to move on by a female security person, which was fair enough as we had been lurking for some time in the dark. Even afterwards we loitered out on the street for a while to share out the stash of Trev's books amongst us and deciding where everyone was going to head off to. It was hugs all round and many goodbyes: the first of many, as it transpired. The Rampants have met up several times since and hopefully will for years to come.
But for a first ever cricket match; the 2007 September Surrey v Lancs CC game will take a heck of a lot of beating!
