It’s As Easy As A,B,deV.

We were going to miss the start, but it was the best I could do. I knocked off at lunch and got the train back to Penrith, picked young master up from school early (bonus!) and then just caught the Mountains train back into town; the signal blackspot affected the Giant’s internal scratch match on the live stream and text updates from Kath with the score awaiting us ahead.

His first trip to the SCG. His second game of cricket. First international. So it wasn’t Australia, but who knows; de Villiers or Gayle might get hold of it, you never know.

As we entered through gates we catch a glimpse of the scoreboard, Amla 50-something, Du Plessis 49. There’s an eruption to greet our arrival. We find our seats in the Bradman concourse and apply the sunscreen. Beautiful afternoon after a stormy morning.

I just finish telling young master that while Chris Gayle might be handy as a bowler, he’s really a batsman, don’t expect too much, when he takes both the big scalps on offer in the space of a couple of balls. The roar that greets de Villiers is huge. There’s a palpable expectation in the air. We want to see something special.

He starts slow. Rossouw takes the role of the aggressor and de Villiers settles in with a series of singles and the occasional two. He doesn’t hit his first boundary until his 19th ball.

Kath arrives after work and I bring her up to speed. Some nice shots, nothing too spectacular yet. de Villiers in his early fifties.

The he went Bang! From a run a ball 15, his first 50 came off 30 balls, his second off 22 and his third only 12. That last fifty was just mental.

Rossouw and Miller both depart – Miller to an absolute special by Taylor on the boundary. If he hadn’t stuck his mitt out and snagged it one handed sprinting too his right, I would have caught it neatly in my lap.

I look up at the scoreboard; over 48 to begin; a bowling change has the young captain Jason Holder bringing himself back on to bowl the final two from the Randwick end. He has, the more than perfectly respectable figures of, 1-40 off eight with two maidens. Apart from Gayle’s couple of overs for a couple of wickets, he is the best performed of the Windies bowlers.

Jason Omar Holder meet Abraham Benjamin de Villers.

Ouch.

Spank.

64 runs dispatched in last two Holder overs. He ends with the worst wold cup bowling figures ever and the fifth worst of all time. de Villiers is a freak. What an innings.

When the total kicked past 400 we knew the Windies were no hope. not even with Chris Gayle.

Chris Gayle, feast or famine, more Watto Lotto than Watto. Went for three.

Wickets fell and what runs there were, were scored slowly. It didn’t matter. We’d just seen an innings. Nothing was topping that tonight. Small milestones were greeted politely Tahir’s fifth, a Windies batsmen getting to double figures.

Young Holder came out to bat with the total on 63-7. To his credit, it was a captain’s knock. He went past his previous best of 22 with some really nice and solid stroke play and closed in on his 50.

A punch through the covers gives him the milestone. I stand up, both to stretch my legs and to acknowledge the achievement. His wicket for 56 has us making rough calculations as to which train we’ll be able to make.

Mercifully it takes but a few more deliveries and the biggest winning margin in world cup history is etched into the record books, along with the fastest 150 in one day history.

Somehow we wind up in the Circular Quay queue but eventually make the 10:18pm Mountains train from central.

Young man is tired, but pretty happy with the afternoon and evening’s entertainment; just like his old man.