Radio
Bowled over
Michael Vestey
What's the score? I enquire, having been away from Test Match Special on Radio Four long wave for some minutes. My partner Katie 'tells me that Mullguly is bowling at Ganglally and some lucky chap has been in a leg over' situation and had six maidens under the age of 26. I explain that Mullally is in fact bowling at Ganguly, and an 'over' is not what she thinks it is; a maiden is not a young woman but six balls bowled without a run being scored off them. Ah, she sighs, still baffled. I persist: what's the score? I don't know, she says.
And why, she wants to know, are the commentators always talking about food? They keep saying 'at lunch' or 'before lunch' or 'after lunch'. If it's not lunch it's tea. Oh, there is one thing I might like to know: a dog has run off with the ball. A dog? Yes, a Jack Russell. No, he's the wicketkeeper, scored a century in the first innings, you know. Well, really, the look I get is saying, fancy naming someone after a dog. Well, I don't suppose they did ...
She tells me she didn't realise that ani- mals featured in cricket so much. There was a dickie bird hopping around the wick- et, someone called 'Aggers' kept referring to that. Someone else called 'Blowers' was interested in pigeons pecking at his crease and seagulls were everywhere. Do I explain that the dickie bird is Mr Harold Dickie Bird, the distinguished umpire presiding over his last Test Match? No, I do not. I concentrate, instead, on the cricket and the commentary on Test Match Special. I learn much from this conversation: that cricket is unfathomable to non-believers and how irritating it must be for listeners on long wave to find ball-by-ball commen- tary all day. Of course, they can retune to Radio Four on FM but many people, espe- cially the elderly, find modern, more sophisticated radio sets just as mysterious as cricket. Those living in northern Europe who pick up Radio Four on long wave can- not retune and are stuck with cricket from eleven in the morning to six at night with a break for The World at One.
For me, though, Test Match Special is quintessential broadcasting, radio in its finest, purest form; people just speaking into a microphone, without scripts, often eloquently about a subject rich in history, steeped in folklore, lightened by humour and darkened by psychological tragedy. Over the years it has been held together brilliantly by its producer, Peter Baxter. It has had some of the supreme radio com- mentators: John Arlott, Brian Johnston, Don Mosey, Henry Blofeld 'Blowers', Christopher Martin-Jenkins and Jonathan Agnew, to name a few. Its pundits are won- derful characters of the kind only cricket produces; regulars like the curmudgeonly Fred Trueman, one of my boyhood heroes, the grumpy Trevor Bailey — 'Good ball, bad stroke, back to the pavilion'; David Lloyd, now part of the England manage- ment, with his new engaging Lancashire humour; occasional contributors like the unforgiving perfectionist Geoffrey Boycott, the impish David Gower. When the life-enhancing Brian Johnston died last year, I thought Test Match Special would never be the same. So powerful and enthusing was his presence on the radio that his death seemed to lower that inde- finable sense of well being we experience at times. But this year, during the first Tests at Edgbaston and Lords, it has recovered well. Johnston was irreplaceable but Blofeld is the next best thing.
`Good afternoon, Ravi old thing,' he'll say as the Indian commentator, former cricketer Ravi Shastri, enters the commen- tary box. 'Gangers is doing well out there.' `Gangers' is the aforementioned Suarav Ganguly who was scoring a century for India in his first Test. Blowers likes his birds. Any passing pigeon or seagull will receive five seconds of fame: 'There's a cormorant flying over the pavilion. Well, well, well ... ' Jonathan Agnew — Aggers — has become a first-rate commentator and Christopher Martin-Jenkins is as fluent and knowledge- able as ever. Some listeners used to com- plain that there was far too much banter in Test Match Special but I never thought so. You could hear some of the most enthralling anecdotes when rain stopped play. Now, unfortunately, we are quickly returned to the Radio Four schedules and there are fewer stories from the past.
I thought I heard one of the visiting Indi- an commentators Harsha Boghle mention a cricketer with the nickname 'Poppadum Fingers'. This led to a scholarly discussion about poppadums. Boghle said they weren't called that in India. In fact, he added, the first time he'd heard the word vindaloo was in England. 'I don't know what it is.' It's a fairly hot Indian dish,' said Trevor Bailey sagely. He'd had an excellent curry the night before. 'I've known a few hot Indian dishes,' said Boghle, 'and that's not one of them.'
Martin-Jenkins disclosed that he'd once gone out with a lovely girl called, I think, Tina Tiddler and Blofeld was preoccupied with the Lords' dustbins and puzzled that they had changed colour since the morning. An investigation was mounted and the dis- covery made that the bins were different colours each side and that they had been turned round. At that point I wanted to know the score. I did not ask Katie.
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