After an online search, I have discovered that the village where we are staying at the end of June has a cricket team, and a home game on the Saturday we are there.

For a family that has watched an AWFUL lot of "Inspector Morse" and "Midsomer Murders", a country cricket match is high on the list of things we'd want to see.

What is it like to attend a local match? Do we need advance tickets? Do we need folding chairs? Do they sell Pimms Cups?!



(Will anyone get killed?)

You will need something to sit on. You almost certainly won't need tickets. You will need to take your own refreshments normally - the tea is only for the players.
You may get killed if you walk on the pitch.

You need a rug or chairs to sit on, em.... that's it.

If you want booze you'll need to buy it a pub (there will normally be one somewhere around the grounds)

Tickets, no.

Obviously don't sit in front of those big white screens, or move during bowling.

Unless you have any understanding of the game, and even if you do, it can be deadly boring. Many a Sunday spent watching DH bowling for the local club.
I learned how to keep the scorebook to get out of making the teas, and to have something to do.
Eventually kids meant I had an excuse not to go.
F1 on the telly was more my thing.

He never took it up again after we moved to the Netherlands, even though they are keen on cricket.

Tell us which village and we can tell you the nearest pub to the pitch . . .

Take a good (or good bad) book, or your knitting, as well as your refreshments. Be prepared to clap, however desultorily, whenever the crowd does in general (you can ask someone to explain why they're applauding, but don't expect to understand it).

You can bone up in advance, at

http://chrisnicholson.co.za/assets/t..._ever_2014.pdf

This is all very helpful, if not very ... heartening. Bring a book? Knitting? Oh dear. One of my favorite Inspector Morse (guest) characters maintains:

"It is quite simply the BEST game in the world. It's war without violence. Deployment of men, psychology, bravery, great skill, camaraderie, tactics, tension..."

And you tell me to bring a book?!?!?

I can't promise to watch it all afternoon, but I think it will be lovely for a while. My DH played cricket in school, so he will--for once--be able to clue me in to what is going on during a match of any sort. (Sports having been compulsory at school, he has hated them ever since.)

Mostly, I want to hear the sound of the ball clicking against the bat, see the whites against the grass, and have a drink in the afternoon.

Thank you all for the advice.

I hope the sun shines and you have a lovely time.

I never took to cricket. Rowing was more my thing (now that is <i>really</i> boring to watch).

>>It is quite simply the BEST game in the world. It's war without violence. Deployment of men, psychology, bravery, great skill, camaraderie, tactics, tension…<,

'tis.

But a book and knitting and a wander over to the pub just make it better

When I lived in the UK my ex joined the village cricket side - first few times up he held/swung the bat as if he was playing baseball for which he was roundly mocked but he soon became pretty good.

He played (and I made tea and sandwiches) for about 3 years.

Is it Chipping Campden? We saw the match between 2 pubs at the field just outside of town. Frankly, the field was a bit away from where people stand and just seemed so "local" that we felt odd. We stayed for about 20 minutes.

You may get killed if you walk on the pitch.>>

or if you walk in front of the sight screen [that big white thing] when the bowler is bowling from that end.

for those who need a cricket refresher course, this may help [and apologies to those for whom it's old hat]:

You have two sides, one out in the field and one in.

Each man that's in the side that's in goes out, and when he's out he comes in and the next man goes in until he's out.

When they are all out, the side that's out comes in and the side thats been in goes out and tries to get those coming in, out.

Sometimes you get men still in and not out.

When a man goes out to go in, the men who are out try to get him out, and when he is out he goes in and the next man in goes out and goes in.

There are two men called umpires who stay all out all the time and they decide when the men who are in are out.

When both sides have been in and all the men have out, and both sides have been out twice after all the men have been in, including those who are not out, that is the end of the game!

I also found this - some of it's a bit tedious but the cartwheeling wicket keeper and Andrew Strauss destroying his sunglasses are worth watching:

https://www.buzzfeed.com/awesomer/cr...Er#.rwGoJAydBg

annhig, the trouble with that explanation is that it makes no allowance for the tea interval, which is rather the point of the exercise......

Awwwwwwww - thanks so much for the primer, annhig! I will amaze and confound my DH with how much I already KNOW about cricket.

Thanks everyone, again, for the advice. I'm gong to have to report back, now, aren't I?

And with a nod to Homer Simpson: "Mmmmmmmmm. Tea interval...."

On refreshments

A growing number of Cotswold cricket clubs will have expanded their club facilities over the past decade to cope with the game's extraordinary mini-boom - and exploit the substantial funding available for better sports facilities, especially from the National Lottery.

So there's a reasonable chance you'll find a larger, though rigorously art-directed, pavilion (colonial dialects call this a "clubhouse" but don't you dare) serving booze as well as tea - and teas. That might include Pimms, more often sold by the jug.

You still might need your own folding chairs, though there is now usually adequate bench seating near the pavilion, usually arranged picnic-style around tables. Crowds are typically larger for Saturday morning children's classes (a ritual called "nets"), which are now a social event for local parents, than for inter-village matches.

No one will be killed unless the village is Midsommer - oops I forgot an Australian bowler tragically was killed but I don't think local bowlers will bowl that fast.
Thank goodness annhig didn't talk about silly mid on, covers, silly point , slips , third leg . Enjoy the game - my son played cricket in Yorkshire and loved the atmosphere .

>>Thank goodness annhig didn't talk about silly mid on, covers, silly point , slips , third leg <<

There is always the chance of seeing someone bowl a maiden over.

I will be bowled over if I have a jug of Pimms.

There is always the chance of seeing someone bowl a maiden over.>>

don't start, Patrick. Before you know it someone will be channelling their inner Brian Johnston:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsVTpX7LdZQ