Next, to the b having Kent v Sussex from the Gillette Cup at Canterbury

We joined them and you can stood regarding longest waiting line, having Greig’s trademark. In the event it is actually finally my personal change, We summoned up bravery and you can informed your, which have a small quaver, it was a beneficial « helluva connect ». A unique idol minted indeed there immediately after which. For the next several years, as he ran with the wide movement, Greig ended up an advisable however, difficult hero – a silver doubloon, never ever totally losing their essential lustre but frequently trying to find therapeutic polishing. Over the next few 12 months, I noticed him off during the Hove for the majority domestic game. Conserve for five wickets and a quick 93 against Hampshire into the July 1969, I don’t think of him while making one extreme sum. But the guy usually performed anything. A booming protection push or a tow shot bouncing off of the scoreboard getting half dozen.

Sussex thrashed them, and Greig is Man of your Matches: 54 in the first innings, out-of 199, and five wickets

Or an excellent bouncer injudiciously aimed at Mike Procter’s head, whom next strike your having cuatro, 4, six, cuatro as he was clobbered for more than 130 of 20 weird overs. And then he always closed autographs. I got your seven times in two 12 months. Immediately after, the guy also said, « Ach, it’s you once more. I never watched him reject some body. I sat under the distribute boughs of one’s well-known lime tree. Robbo regaled us throughout the day that have stories off viewing Les Ames, Godfrey Evans and you may Doug Wright while pires escroqueries par correspondance the a boy. The middle lamb was a mind container who’d arranged an enthusiastic encyclopaedic knowledge of Kent cricket, in order to their own father’s apparent fulfillment, not merely admonished him when he nudged me and discussed an attractive « popsy » throughout the crowd however, remedied him as he got particular truth otherwise profile wrong.

That has been often. Robbo was never ever you to definitely having analytical detail; it was the story one to mattered. Kent’s illustrious records – if truth otherwise misconception – don’t help far thereon hot July day. By the end of the day, both middle lamb and you can Robbo himself had been certainly smitten. I realized you to definitely to be true once the, despite their daughter from earshot, my cousin no further talked of the latest enough time move out-of piss, but out of « Greigy ».

Greig starred just a help part that day; a simple-flames 36 on the Sussex innings as well as 2 wickets, together with that of Kent’s best scorer, Graham Johnson, trapped because of the Tony Buss of a long-increase

And Sussex did it again 3 years later. Gillette Cup one-fourth-final, August step 1, 1973, during the Hove. From this day Greig is actually a recently mainly based The united kingdomt athlete and you can Sussex head. Once again, I went with Robbo, therefore we very nearly missed they. My personal sibling got organized the day nevertheless when we pitched up ticketless at Tate Gates, we were completely turned into out. A good sellout. The stewards (« soft absolutely nothing Hitlers ») had no vehicle that have Robbo’s « Come on, it’s the boy’s birthday celebration today. » (It wasn’t.) But, the guy was not letting go of one to effortlessly of course, if informed a little warily about precisely how I’d on the crushed free-of-charge with my friends, the next thing I understood I was giving my portly buddy a feet-up over the backyard wall of just one of big households one recognized on the ocean end of crushed. Into the, buoyed of the all of our success, Robbo’s attraction strike overdrive and then he somehow sweet-spoke the new shorter draconian during the-soil ushers so efficiently, we wound up regarding the gangway of one’s members’ pavilion, correct next to the players’ balcony. In basic innings I saw once the Greig did his method as a consequence of almost a complete package out-of Benson and Hedges, and you can Robbo, really the only Kent supporter in our midst, cheered every work at because the his lads chased 264 throughout the next. Today an adolescent, I happened to be a small ashamed by this, but thank goodness here weren’t many. Operates, that is. Kent have been bowled away getting 135. However, one did not count. Just like the participants stood into outfield and basked regarding many thanks of one’s 10,000-good group, Sussex had claimed. We spotted just like the brief boys in-line to obtain the skipper’s autograph – I found myself most importantly one now – and you will noted one to Robbo got joined all of them. The guy and Greig have been in the near future involved with move discussion. Each other had been laughing, thoughts tossed straight back, because waiting line regarding brief boys offered, moving on anxiously out of base to help you ft. Shortly after just what seemed a lifetime, they shook give warmly and you may Robbo patted his the fresh new buddy familiarly on the back. He showed up bounding back-up new pavilion strategies, clutching their closed scorecard – « It’s to the middle lamb, » he lied – and you may beaming off ear-to-ear. « He could be a soft fantastic bloke. » The feeling it absolutely was Greig’s Sussex you to definitely acquired the overall game was palpable. John Spencer, the latest Sussex bowler, told me has just when Greig grabbed more, the entire conditions within a bar « dogged of the backbiting, cynicism and negativity » changed nearly right-away. Greig is actually a breath off bracing ocean heavens.