A beach, a backyard, the thwack of a ball on willow: "Beach cricket is the essence of summer throughout the civilised cricketing world, writes John Huxley.
That's me. The little bloke with the dodgy bat and baggy shorts. The year is probably 1956 or '57, possibly summer, during a rare break in the rain for which our holidays in Wales were famous. Hence, the spoof tourism slogan: ''Wales. You're welcome to it.''
The place is certainly Pendine Sands, an 11-kilometre stretch of beach on the south coast so flat and wide that for decades it hosted world land-speed record attempts. Playing in the nearby dunes, we'd often stumble over bits of broken cars, even of boy racers.
That's my brother, in the even baggier shorts, appropriately standing behind two other planks of wood. And in the distance is my father, reduced it appears to bowling ''Aussie to Kiwi'' style as he waits for the tide to come in and/or the pubs to open.
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My mother, a more-than-useful square leg, must be taking the picture. Everyone else, it seems, has got bored and gone home as I edge towards what I imagine must have been another double century. A legend on the beach, in my own backyard, in my own mind."
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