Clarification: The Headline Photo Is Lord’s. Not Radlett.
Readers of this piece might be deceived into thinking that I spent an entire fortnight at the end of August 2025 watching cricket. Nothing could be further from the truth.
However, the only photogenic and noteworthy events I attended, as it happens, were cricket. The rest is… [insert your choice of expletive here].
17 August: Middlesex v Yorkshire At Radlett
A long in the planning arrangement to meet up with Yorkshire Simon & Jilly Black at Radlett, where Middlesex & Yorkshire were to do battle in a One Day Cup match.
The events in the days prior to the match seemed almost too good to be true. Both teams were towards or at the top of the table, making the clash meaningful tournament-wise, unlike our previous meet-up there for the same fixture a couple of years earlier:
Also, it seemed that the weather would smile on us for the day, as it had done in 2023. That is one good thing about having the plethora of outground cricket in July and August – those are probably the most reliable months for dry weather, which really is a big help at outgrounds like Radlett.
We all turned up. Even some of Simon’s friends who we hadn’t been told to expect turned up, which added to the “informal gathering” vibe.
Sadly, Middlesex didn’t turn up, but we don’t need to talk about that bit. In 2023, Yorkshire barely turned up.
Jilly had never been to a cricket match before. Being someone who wouldn’t exactly describe herself as a sports lover, she showed some reluctance at having the LBW law explained to her in excruciating detail. Nor did Jilly seem keen to understand the difference between finger spin and wrist spin.
Jilly did, however, notice a women sitting in front of us, whose posture on the portable folding chair brought on a quite extreme “builder’s bum” appearance. I would never have noticed such a thing, but Jilly pointed it out to Janie and Janie then pointed it out to me. Once such a thing has been pointed out to you, it is hard to avoid taking the occasional glance, although I think I did better self-control job than Jilly:
Janie was too polite to photograph the costume malfunction woman, who, I hope, remained oblivious to the distraction she had unwittingly caused.
It was a weird afternoon in more ways than just bum cleavage. When Janie and I went to the loo, we noticed a person, quite clearly an elderly man, entering the women’s portacabin toilet. Janie and another woman went in soon after. I waited outside until all had emerged, just in case. First the man, then the other woman, then Janie. The two women paused to have a chat about the experience, as Janie had challenged the man, gently, asking…
…are you in the right place?
Yes…
…said the man, incredulously.
I went through the appropriate door, did my small amount of business and then turned/returned to photograph the portacabin toilet doors, to see if there was any ambiguity in the signage:
None of this stopped us from having a very enjoyable afternoon at Radlett with Simon and Jilly.
20 August: The Hundred At Lord’s Plus The Night Tapes
The weather was great. Janie and I got to Lord’s in good time and bagged one of Janie’s favourite spots on the sun deck. We enjoyed the women’s match pretty much in its entirety and then went to have a quick look at the tennis court, which turned into a longer look than intended such that we missed most of the gig, which is a shame because I quite liked the dreamy sound of IIris and her gang, The Night Tapes, when I researched the matter oh so thoroughly the night before the gig.
I especially liked this one, when researching:
As is often the case for us on these The Hundred days, we had enjoyed ourselves enough by about 65-70 balls into the first of the men’s match innings, so we grabbed some shawarmas from The Cedar stall on exit and followed the end of the match on TV while munching and drinking some wine.
Our day on finals day ended similarly, but before that day ended…
31 August: The Hundred Finals Day Including A Perrie Concert
Again we got to Lord’s in good time, although we were, for the first time in ages, to take in this match from the Warner stand, not the pavilion. I had prioritised a physiotherapy appointment over being able to log in first in the queue for The Hundred tickets on the day the tickets were released. đŸ˜‡
Actually it was a nice perspective on finals day – not least because we could hear the hullabaloo better from the Warner than you can up top in the pavilion.
The women’s match was a good one.
During the interval between matches, Barry Nathan popped over for a chat.
After being elevated in front of the media centre, Perrie popped around to our stand, bringing her dance-and-pose troupe with her:
You can see Perrie’s full performance through this link.
Or you might prefer the highlights that Janie (Daisy) videoed for herself which, obviously, are better…or at least, shorter and more to the point:
After all that commotion, even the fireworks at the start of the second match seemed tame:
After watching the end of the second match at home over shawarmas and wine, I did wonder whether the Oval franchise might be renamed The Oval Inevitables unless the authorities change the recruitment rules for future seasons.
Still, Janie and I always enjoy these days out at Lord’s, and this year’s finals day was no exception.
