Kent Cricket at Lord's | Down the Lane

On the balcony, every Cricketers dream!

As a young lad, then as a teenager, I would read my Cricket Annuals and often peruse over the photograph's of some of the most famous Cricketers of that time standing on the Players Balcony at Lord's.

Sure, I had dreams of playing there and looking down on the crowd from that sacred spot, but the fact I wasn't very good at Cricket prevented that ambition!!
So, your young days go and the dreams so often vanish with them. It was like that for some forty years, then one day I find myself being Dressing Room Attendant for Kent.

Since my job started in 2002, I have now been to Lord's four times, each time standing or sitting just where I saw the likes of Peter May, David Shepherd, Gary Sobers and many many more. Each time is a different game, but the emotion is the same, each time I walk into the Dressing Room and look through the double doors on to the small balcony and beyond to the pitch itself, a sense of youth comes rushing back - I may not have played cricket for England, but I am in a place where few have been and I love every minute of it.

Peter, the Dressing Room Attendant for the away Teams is always kitted out in shirt, tie and jacket during the match hours, then hastily changing to track suit at the end for the normal 'Cricket Attendant Duties' (clearing up the mess - which is no different to anywhere else I should add!!).

Another highlight is the food there, Silver Service and waited upon my some very polite and helpful Waitress's.

All in all, from the moment you walk past the Stewards at the Pavilion Door, mix with those Members who you're sure are all immensely rich, wander through the Long Room immersed in it's history, you know you are somewhere special.

So, it's been a 40 over match, the final of the C&G Cup and two twenty/20 matches against Middlesex.

From a 'razzy' point of view, sitting in the dug out at a twenty/20 game has to be a big highlight of my time with Kent; the noise of the crowd, the eternal buzz of conversation interupted by cheers and chants etc.

So, when the bones and the muscles won't take the drink carrying and cleaning any more, I have memories to sit and be comforted with.

Finally, what is nicest is a strange sense of fulfilling a dream it has given me. I can go on from here and know that maybe other dreams I have had in the past may even come true as well!

A day out to Lord's, the home of Cricket

On the balcony, every Cricketers dream!