No worries

Sometimes even the schedules provided by Jet Airways and Jet Lite (pay for your snacks and sit with your knees propped on the back of the seat in front of you) are too hard for the ICC to handle and they are forced to do the sensible thing and charter an aeroplane.

Based on the scheduled flights available, the New Zealand and Zimbabwe teams were originally due to fly out of Ahmedabad at just after midnight following their game at the Sardar Patel Stadium on Monday and land in Mumbai around 1:30am. From there it was a 2:30am flight to Colombo arriving at 4:30am – followed by a three-and-a-half hour bus journey to Kandy. Zimbabwe were due to practise at 10:00am, barely an hour after travelling through the night.

Fortunately there was an early outbreak of common sense and the organisers hired one of Jet Airway’s finest – a 180-seater for 60. There was an inflight entertainment system, too, which had some of the latest movies on offer. I might never have watched “True Grit” had it not been an option – and I might never have discovered how brilliant it is.

The night before was a comedy of errors. Allan Donald has always been keen on the tradition of sharing a cold beer after a game and he wasn’t about to let the ‘dry’ state of Gujarat get in the way. Somehow he organised “quite a few” beers in the Black Caps team room and started calling the Zim guys to invite them down. But having been thrashed by 10 wickets, they were less than keen. And those that were up for a beer had their own, far more modest collection. “I did my best but I reckon we left about 50 behind when we left this morning…” bemoaned a whistful Donald.

Jacques Kallis wasn’t exactly singing and dancing after South Africa’s nail-biting loss to England but he was refreshingly and pleasantly upbeat:

“What a fantastic World Cup- so far! India’s tie against England, Ireland’s amazing win against England and then England defending 170 against South Africa. What entertainment, what drama. Fantastic,” he said afterwards. And he really meant it.

“I’m not just being polite, it’s genuine. The Ireland game was terrible from the perspective of our personal lives because our wives and girlfriends were gradually ignored as the match entered the last hour and a half.

“And although we lost to England, it was another great game of cricket. Obviously I think we should have won, and I’m as fed up as I would have been 16 years ago when I started, but life has taught me many lessons over the last decade and a half and I’m happy to see the positives from the game, mainly that we learned from our mistakes. Guys like Faf and Morne may not have much international experience but they’ve both played a lot of cricket in their careers and that means you learn quickly. It’ll be different if and when we get conditions like that again.”

You’ve got to love some of the security guards assigned to keep us all safe. Those assigned to indoor positions in the teams’ hotels are quick to kick their shoes off and put their feet up while those given less cushy jobs outside – and out of sight – simply stretch out on the concrete and go to sleep. The four men assigned to guard the top of the stairs from the roof terrace of our hotel in Ahmedabad slept for three straight hours. The biggest threat they posed to potential invaders was as a tripping obstacle.

But we appreciate the thought.