Back to the Rose Bowl

Up early again this morning for a fully packed day.  Mary was off school today (the teachers are having training days this Friday and again on Monday) so a long weekend break for Mary.  She was spending today with her friend Allie as Sara was supervising two photo shoots for the Calendar and I had errands to run in Salisbury this morning and was then meeting a client near Southampton for a lunchtime business meeting.  Penny F arrived at breakfast time to go over to a secret location in the Bourne Valley for a garden shoot.  I drove into Salisbury to do some banking before driving to North Baddesley to meet up with my client at The Water Margin Chinese restaurant where we had a light business lunch and discussed a number of issues.  I got back to Winterslow at around 3.45 p.m. which just gave me a hour before Tom and I left again to pick up Richard and Johnno to go to the Rose Bowl in Southampton to watch Hampshire v. Gloucestershire in the Friends Life T20 competition.  Currently Hampshire are top on the South Group Table and Gloucestershire bottom.  We arrived in good time and inadvertently sat in the sponsorship area at the top of the Pavilion and had just settled when we were asked to shift.  Fortunately, we still managed to get good seats under cover.  The weather looked decidedly "iffy" all evening.  Hampshire lost the toss and Gloucestershire put them into bat.  Apart from a short interruption in play, Hampshire completed their 20 overs with a score of 139 for 7.  Not particularly high and a relatively easy target for Gloucestershire. We were running about twenty minutes behind schedule when Gloucestershire went into bat and started losing wickets almost immediately.  The score was 80 for 5 when rain forced a further stoppage of play and following discussions in the Pavilion the Duckworth/Lewis Rules were introduced and Gloucesterhsire needed to reach 124 runs from 17 overs to win.  At the time of the stoppage they had only played 8 overs.  In the end, Duckworth/Lewis did not apply as Hampshire bowled the whole of the team out for 107 before they reached the 17th over.  A great win for Hampshire.  It was interesting to see the D/L Rules in use.  We managed to get to the car park and away within 15 minutes of the game ending and were back in Winterslow at 11.30 p.,m.  I really do enjoy watching first class cricket.  Tonight we had the privilege of seeing the greatest bowler in Test history at work (Muralitharan of Sri Lanka and Gloucestershire) who has taken over 800 Test wickets and thereby beaten Hampshire and Australia's own Shane Warne.  This was the first cricket match Johnno had ever seen and so he was well pleased with it; being a good first class cricket match.  We were also treated the sight of a streaker running across the pitch in the first innings. I hope to get to see some more T20 before the end of the season.  Hampshire play Sussex on Monday.  Tempting to go again!  I spent tonight, before going to bed, trying to understand theea Duckworth/Lewis Rules in greater detail.  I understand the theory but the practice is a bit different.  How sad is that!