#WestCountryRevisited

The weather wasn't this nice in the days leading up to the game... 

“There you go… that’s England’s green and pleasant land.”

As Grant looked up from his crossword book to caption the scenery on the return train journey to Gloucester for #WestCountryRevisited, his description was accurate but had to be responded to with a certain amount of disdain.

I’m always in favour of references to Jerusalem the almost-official anthem of English cricket, but it’s dangerous if he gets too comfortable in his familiar surroundings, so I simply chose to point out that Essex is pretty green too.

It was with Essex in mind that I made the return journey, with a T20 fixture to see at the fabled Cheltenham festival, the less said about the result though, the better.

As Gloucestershire’s Chris Dent, AKA The Dentist, hit the winning runs, a grinning Grant stood up, offered his hand and said that’s one each… he was forgetting the second game Essex had won against them this year, but he was close enough, and there’s still one more match to go this season back at fortress Chelmsford.

Following up on my March trip to Meadow Park and Whaddon Road, there were more of the West Country’s delights to sample this time.

I sat and had a drink adjacent to what is apparently the longest village green in England, and despite the fact that building a road through the middle of it makes it wholly unsuitable for cricket, the locals aren’t concerned… we’ll just change the rules, they thought. 

WE also took the trip into the heart of the Forest of Dean for another of Gloucester City’s ‘home’ matches, a friendly against Newport County.

Fair advance warnings were delivered about the Forest of Dean and while I didn’t witness any webbed feet, it was an experience nonetheless.

Just as Grant’s dad was explaining that the wild boar that roam the land were getting out of hand and there was talk of a cull, we passed a dead one in the road, and an age-old forest proverb was born as I attempted to describe the scene.

Wild boar, roam no more.

Poetry.

Cinderford Town was the host for the game, and in those 90 minutes we experienced torrential rain, gusting wind and bright sunshine, a veritable smorgasbord of weather that would have had Tomasz Schafernaker licking his lips.

The game itself was a standard pre-season affair, though two travelling fans attempted to spoil it from the row behind by providing insight and commentary that made Danny Murphy sound like a combination of a tactical genius on a level above Mourinho and William Shakespeare’s true linguistic heir, all in one go. Painful.

If one image could sum up that journey though it would be the one that I’ll forever struggle to shake.

As we were descending back towards civilisation we passed a lamppost with a unique decoration. Lara Croft.

Gun drawn and ready for action, the life size Lara (waxwork/dummy/doll?) was tied to the unsuspecting street light by a bike lock, and she looked like she was there for the long haul.

The thunderstorms followed me west, so while the east of the country was recovering from Thursday night’s mayhem, I was reliving it in the ‘Shire, apart from that though, another splendid trip.