Damazan in distress

Thursday

Unbelievably we have another game of cricket scheduled for today- I make that 2 in 4 days- who organised this schedule, they must be mad ? Luckily I'm down for a rest today, so a stop at the supermarket is required as we try to recreate the Bear at Home bar in Damazan- possibly the most picturesque ground in the South West- or maybe not.

Apparently it's a "bastide" town, well it's certainly a right " bastide" to get too. First impressions were good, although they have the same water melon sales shacks as St Aulaye & the toilet/shower block confuses several of our players who can't decide which is which. If you really want to know about the cricket, there's a Damazan report, written by a guy who was paying attention http://www.damazancricket.com/2010-match-reports. They were pretty impressed with our team, particularly a young chappie they called "Hessic" who "scored a hard hit 51", his first runs on tour since decimalisation. I believe they are looking to sign an "enforcer" for their youth team, and Nige could be their man. Personally I was more impressed with Le Deno who hit a boundary to register a PB of 6 & Jacques Oh, who didn't hit anything and trudged off with the Duck Hat firmly on his head. This was a real low point for him, and he suddenly looked older than Messey & Gibbsey combined. Cue The Temple of Doom, who 2 minutes later met the same fate, and Jacques Oh was up and charging on to the field like a puppy, maybe quite a fat puppy, but nevertheless a dramatic transformation. Dave hardly made it off the square before having the Chapeau de Canard rammed onto his ginger nest. The only other moment of note that I saw was Damazan's founder, Jean Claude, walking in to bat, with the job of saving the match for them; apparently he had driven for nearly 3 hours to get here, promptly got a duck (a fine catch by Felcher, considering he was sucking on a straw at the time) and faced another 3 hour drive home. So we returned to Bordeaux in high spirits with an unbeaten record, and prospects of another night out on the town. One slightly disturbing moment was Twixie letting his hair down, literally, on the bus, and he did deservedly receive a yellow card for this; not as bad as Messey's red card incident on Monday, but still pretty disgusting.

PS can someone send me "Messey the movie" for online publication ?