I`m looking for something to change the tone, get away from a world full of nonsense and get back to something that truly matters whilst the mere players of the world stage have their exits and their entrances. So before I get even more Shakespearean, let`s look no further than the game of cricket and some of the exits and entrances, the ins and outs of the beautiful game.
It`s not all good news, of course - nothing really is - but there are some examples from the world of cricket that perhaps show that, like life itself, the game has as much to do with chance as it does design. A few examples...
As an avid follower of both Hampshire and Kent cricket I have been watching the rise and fall of two or three of their players. In recent times Kent`s senior batsman, Joe Denly, has had a fair run in the England set-up, earning a call up to the Test team in January, 2019 at the age of 32. In 15 test matches, he scored over 800 runs at an average of just under 30. He played his last test match in July of this year. Hampshire captain James Vince played 13 test matches for England, scoring over 500 runs at an average of just under 30 and played his last test in March 2018 against New Zealand. The problem they both had was a penchant for getting into the 20s, 30s, 40s by virtue of elegance and determination but then getting out, sometimes by way of chance, others by misfortune. So it was perhaps understandable that their brief test careers - their exits - were inevitable.
Now due to injuries and enforced absences, someone was needed to bat at No. 3 - the position largely occupied by Messrs. Denly and Vince - but rather than recalling either of them, the gig went to Kent`s Zak Crawley, at just 22 a relative novice to the international arena. And what does he do? He only goes and scores 267 in the current Test against Pakistan and thus cements his pace for some time to come. I refrain from suggesting that it helps when the England Selector is a former Kent player - that would be unfair - but it might just be another link in the chain of entrances and exits.
The world of cricket is full of instances of chance, opportunity, spectacular entrance and tragic exit. I`ve got quite a collection of cricket books, as you might expect, and they include the lives of those such as Tom Graveney, Harold Larwood, Marcus Trescothick, Ben Stokes and one volume ("Silence of the Heart") which catalogues the far too many cricketers who have taken their own lives. But the example I turn to is that of a true hero of mine, whose exploits I followed on the steam radio back in the 1940s and early 50s - Harold Gimblett, who must surely be the prime example of the spectacular entrance and the tragic exit.
His entrance is the stuff of fantasy - he was called up to make the numbers up for Somerset in May 1935 when the county was short of players against Yorkshire at Frome. He went in to bat at No. 8 when Somerset were in real trouble and went on to score 123 in 80 minutes with dazzling stroke play. After that he stayed with the county until retiring from cricket in 1954. By then he had scored 49 centuries, over 23,000 runs with a top score of 310 against Sussex in 1948. He played just three times for England, largely due to the War but also to his reticence at being selected into what he felt was an uncomfortable environment for him.
He and his wife moved away from his native Somerset and he spent his years of retirement in a mobile home in Verwood in Dorset, where in March 1978 he took his own life. He played cricket by accident - the accident of Somerset being short handed back in 1935 - without which who knows what direction his life might have travelled and perhaps not ended in such tragic circumstances. For more about the legend of Harold Gimblett,please see https://www.thein-cider.co.uk/the-legends-harold-gimblett-folklore-formed-in-freezing-frome/
Maybe we are all guided by the knife-edge of chance - the crossroads we come to. I suppose a fair proportion of us were born by accident and a strange philosophical thread seems to run through many lives. Maybe one or two people fell ill and were unable to board the Titanic? Maybe some were caught up in a traffic jam and missed the plane which crashed with no survivors? `Fate` is the nebulous, convenient word we use to describe how things that happen in our lives are often fashioned by unexpected circumstances.
On the Bard of Avon`s world stage, the game of life, like cricket, is indeed a game of chance.
It`s not all good news, of course - nothing really is - but there are some examples from the world of cricket that perhaps show that, like life itself, the game has as much to do with chance as it does design. A few examples...
As an avid follower of both Hampshire and Kent cricket I have been watching the rise and fall of two or three of their players. In recent times Kent`s senior batsman, Joe Denly, has had a fair run in the England set-up, earning a call up to the Test team in January, 2019 at the age of 32. In 15 test matches, he scored over 800 runs at an average of just under 30. He played his last test match in July of this year. Hampshire captain James Vince played 13 test matches for England, scoring over 500 runs at an average of just under 30 and played his last test in March 2018 against New Zealand. The problem they both had was a penchant for getting into the 20s, 30s, 40s by virtue of elegance and determination but then getting out, sometimes by way of chance, others by misfortune. So it was perhaps understandable that their brief test careers - their exits - were inevitable.
Now due to injuries and enforced absences, someone was needed to bat at No. 3 - the position largely occupied by Messrs. Denly and Vince - but rather than recalling either of them, the gig went to Kent`s Zak Crawley, at just 22 a relative novice to the international arena. And what does he do? He only goes and scores 267 in the current Test against Pakistan and thus cements his pace for some time to come. I refrain from suggesting that it helps when the England Selector is a former Kent player - that would be unfair - but it might just be another link in the chain of entrances and exits.
The world of cricket is full of instances of chance, opportunity, spectacular entrance and tragic exit. I`ve got quite a collection of cricket books, as you might expect, and they include the lives of those such as Tom Graveney, Harold Larwood, Marcus Trescothick, Ben Stokes and one volume ("Silence of the Heart") which catalogues the far too many cricketers who have taken their own lives. But the example I turn to is that of a true hero of mine, whose exploits I followed on the steam radio back in the 1940s and early 50s - Harold Gimblett, who must surely be the prime example of the spectacular entrance and the tragic exit.
His entrance is the stuff of fantasy - he was called up to make the numbers up for Somerset in May 1935 when the county was short of players against Yorkshire at Frome. He went in to bat at No. 8 when Somerset were in real trouble and went on to score 123 in 80 minutes with dazzling stroke play. After that he stayed with the county until retiring from cricket in 1954. By then he had scored 49 centuries, over 23,000 runs with a top score of 310 against Sussex in 1948. He played just three times for England, largely due to the War but also to his reticence at being selected into what he felt was an uncomfortable environment for him.
He and his wife moved away from his native Somerset and he spent his years of retirement in a mobile home in Verwood in Dorset, where in March 1978 he took his own life. He played cricket by accident - the accident of Somerset being short handed back in 1935 - without which who knows what direction his life might have travelled and perhaps not ended in such tragic circumstances. For more about the legend of Harold Gimblett,please see https://www.thein-cider.co.uk/the-legends-harold-gimblett-folklore-formed-in-freezing-frome/
Maybe we are all guided by the knife-edge of chance - the crossroads we come to. I suppose a fair proportion of us were born by accident and a strange philosophical thread seems to run through many lives. Maybe one or two people fell ill and were unable to board the Titanic? Maybe some were caught up in a traffic jam and missed the plane which crashed with no survivors? `Fate` is the nebulous, convenient word we use to describe how things that happen in our lives are often fashioned by unexpected circumstances.
On the Bard of Avon`s world stage, the game of life, like cricket, is indeed a game of chance.
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