ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
A young man with genetic muscle tone in the 11th percentile has actually weighed up getting cricket spikes today despite the majority of his fourth grade fixtures taking place on artificial turf wickets.
It was a fleeting thought, said 28-year-old Turner James, who had to clarify that his name wasn’t backwards on the press release more than once.
There are many people who play in the Overell T20 Cup competition who bowl and field barefoot as it’s the lowest standard of organised cricket in the Diamantina and often put on by benevolent local businessmen who enjoy gambling on the fixtures.
People from all walks of life. Some just learning the game. Some who’ve played it their whole life but just lack the genetic gift of hand-eye coordination. Others are simply there to enjoy themselves.
Mr James says he’s somewhere between those three.
“I’m a fast bowler, I open the bowling,” he said with a straight face.
“What I really like is coming around the wicket to the left-hander. I relax my elbow and let it hyper-extend a little bit to generate some more pace. I slam my left leg down and send down an absolute thunderbolt that’s almost starting to come down from it’s apex by the time is whistles past the batsman’s face,”
“Sorry, batsperson.”
Our reporter told Mr James the correct term is now “batter”.
“Thanks but as I was saying, too often I’ve found myself slipping over at the crease. My foot loses grip and over I go. So I’ve been looking at spikes,” he contined.
“For about 5 minutes until I just sighed and thought I probably wouldn’t fall over if I tired, you know, bowling less like Shoaib Aktar and more like Steve Waugh on valium,”
“But a boy can dream.”
More to come.
