The Ashes – Fifth Test: Swifty Taylor in Sydney

 

 

It was after a tumultuous night’s sleep that I awoke with my mouth feeling dry and distastefully sour. The dryness could easily be explained by the previous night’s proceedings and would be easily rectified with a finger of Jameson. But I suspected that the sourness – a lingering reaction to the Australian batsmen’s appalling performance in the Boxing Day Test Match – would stay with me for some time. Or at least until an improved performance in the final Ashes Test.

It was absurdly early. The morning sun was trying its best to blast me off the threadbare mattress. There were no blinds on the window. Unsurprising. On a whim, I had decided to take in a day of the Sydney Test, and in the interests of fiscal prudence I had opted for the cheapest accommodation I could find. This meant a flea-ridden hotel room in Marrickville. For the price of a four-star room in Melbourne. Beggars would never be able to be choosers. I was feeling as fragile as Cameron Green’s place in the Test team. But at least I was confident that I could rebound.

Naturally, the previous night had ended in a blur of Irish whiskey and self-loathing. I hadn’t visited Sydney in yonks. How long had it been? Thirty years? Precisely recalling dates and times had never been a forte. Back then I was seeing a Sydney girl named Jennifer, and like a fox crawling back to its den, I visited a few old haunts in the hope of recalling a time when the future was filled with more promise. I started at the Occidental on Erskine St and ended at the Fortune of War in The Rocks. The unsatisfying afternoon bled into the evening, as I searched for something intangible that was just out of reach. Perhaps it had never even been there.

I had plenty of time. So I decided that the best way to clear my head was to walk to the cricket ground. The sun was scorching now. I trudged past the Enmore Theatre content in the knowledge that without the harbour, this city of cockroaches, one-way streets, rugby league, and Peter v’Landys would be nothing. That body of water, with its fingers stretching into each edifice and orifice, was everything that this town had to offer. In fact, some would say that it was the only thing. But maybe I was peering at the city through a jaundiced lens, influenced by memories over which I had no control.

By the time I reached the ground I learned that Australia had opted against selecting a spin bowler. I was no expert, but even I knew that this was not good for the game of cricket. It was a decision that seemed shortsighted, and against the best interests of taking a look at a potential Nathan Lyon replacement. And what’s more, Australia selected eight batsmen! The walk had cleared the fog from the previous night, and I was now starting to think clearly. What defensive nonsense! Green shouldn’t be in the team.

Like Sydney itself, there is mostly a hollowness to the SCG Test, because it is nearly always a dead rubber. I took up my seat, and began to relax. The crowd was large and expectant. The Barmy Army carrying on like pork chops. But one of the best things about actually being at the cricket was not having to suffer through the tv or radio commentary. Much of it is inane, some of it imbecilic. And as I grew older I was becoming much less tolerant of these fools. Anyone would think that Alex Carey invented the idea of standing up to medium pacers. Much of the time I watched it on ‘mute’, which was a slightly unfulfilling experience.

England were well on top when the bad light, then rain, arrived. This meant a long period of no play. I despised rain delays because they left me with too much time to think and reflect – and for me that was fraught with danger. Inevitably, my mind drifted back thirty years. And it drifted back to Jennifer. Back then I would catch the overnight bus from a’Beckett St, and I would arrive at central Station with my eyes hanging out of my head and my consciousness crying out for sleep. Bleary-eyed and worse for wear and tear. We would spend the day together, laughing, walking, eating, drinking, hanging out. At tiny cafes in Chinatown. At pubs like the Occidental and Fortune of War.

She lived in a flat in Bondi Junction and worked as a bank teller in Glebe. One Thursday afternoon, the branch full of pensioners cashing their cheques before heading off to Leagues Clubs to play the one-armed bandits, I approached her counter and passed across to her a note. On it I had scrawled: “I have a pistol in my pocket – just for you”. A twinkly-eyed Jennifer saw the fun in it and laughed too heartily, but not so the branch manager, a humourless twerp who also had the hots for her. She was disciplined for my misdemeanour; he rose through the ranks. Until he was named and shamed and forced to resign prior to an inquiry into his improper conduct. A rare instance of a twat getting his just desserts. It was all so very Sydney.

Eventually our relationship broke like a New Year’s resolution. Jennifer and I conceded that it wouldn’t work out for us. Even though I was full of youthful enthusiasm and desire in those days, I could never contemplate leaving Melbourne. And she was never leaving Sydney. She often made a point of saying the harbour was her favourite thing in the whole world. It would be impossible for me to compete with that splendid expanse of water.

I left the ground, filing out with the last of the punters who had clung desperately to the hope of witnessing more live play. Australia already regretting its decision to not select a spinner. I pondered where I might head to next. Back to the old landmarks that often beset my memories? To search for…what? Ghosts of relationships past? Or maybe I should try somewhere new. Fortuitously, a taxi stopped just as I flagged it. “Where to, mate?” the driver asked. The words tumbled out before I had time to consider alternative options: “The Occidental on Erskine Street”.

 

 

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