I entered them and you will endured in the longest queue, for Greig’s signature. If this is actually fundamentally my personal change, I summoned right up bravery and informed your, which have a small quaver, that it was a good “helluva catch”. A different idol minted there after which. For the next years, as he went for the wide stream, Greig proved a worthwhile however, tricky hero – a silver doubloon, never ever entirely dropping their elemental lustre however, seem to wanting curative refining. Over the second few season, I spotted your down on Hove for the majority household online game. Conserve for 5 wickets and you may a fast 93 facing Hampshire inside the July 1969, I really don’t think of your and also make any high sum. However, the guy constantly did things. A thriving safeguards drive otherwise a tow sample moving from the scoreboard to possess six.
Sussex thrashed them, and you may Greig was People of the Suits: 54 in the 1st innings, off 199, immediately after which four wickets
Otherwise an effective bouncer injudiciously geared towards Mike Procter’s direct, just who up coming struck him to have 4, cuatro, 6, 4 when he is clobbered for over 130 out-of 20 strange overs. And then he always finalized autographs. I had your eight moments in two year. Once, the guy also said, “Ach, it’s you once again. I never watched him refuse people. We seated underneath the distribute boughs of the famous tangerine forest. Robbo regaled all of us all day long with stories out-of seeing Les Ames, Godfrey Evans and Doug Wright since a beneficial boy. The center mutton is actually a mind box that has create a keen encyclopaedic experience in Kent cricket, and to their father’s apparent pleasure, not merely admonished him when he nudged me and discussed an attractive “popsy” regarding audience however, corrected your as he had particular truth or figure completely wrong.
That was usually. Robbo are never ever that having mathematical outline; it absolutely was the story you to mattered. Kent’s illustrious record – if or not facts or myth – didn’t let far on that scorching July big date. Towards the end throughout the day, each other middle lamb and Robbo himself excellent site Г observer was basically demonstrably smitten. We realized you to definitely to be real since the, even with his daughter of earshot, my bro not talked of the enough time streak out of piss, however, out-of “Greigy”.
Greig played merely a services part you to day; an easy-flames 36 throughout the Sussex innings and two wickets, including regarding Kent’s best scorer, Graham Johnson, caught because of the Tony Buss from an extended-leap
And you can Sussex made it happen once more three years after. Gillette Glass one-fourth-final, August step one, 1973, at the Hove. Through this time Greig is actually a freshly founded England athlete and Sussex chief. Again, I went with Robbo, and we virtually skipped it. My personal brother had organized the afternoon but when we pitched right up ticketless at the Tate Doorways, we were solidly became aside. A sellout. Brand new stewards (“bloody little Hitlers”) didn’t come with truck that have Robbo’s “Come on, it will be the boy’s birthday celebration today.” (It wasn’t.) But, he was not stopping you to definitely effortlessly just in case advised a tiny warily regarding how I had with the crushed 100% free having my friends, the next thing We know I found myself offering my personal portly sibling a foot-up over the backyard wall structure of one of the large house you to supported on the sea stop of one’s crushed. Into the, buoyed from the the achievement, Robbo’s appeal struck overdrive in which he somehow sweet-spoke new smaller draconian within the-floor ushers very effortlessly, that individuals wound-up regarding the gangway of your own members’ pavilion, best next to the players’ balcony. From inside the earliest innings We saw since Greig did his method as a consequence of nearly an entire packet regarding Benson and you may Hedges, and you can Robbo, really the only Kent suggest among us, cheered all the work at because the his lads chased 264 from the second. Today an adolescent, I found myself a small ashamed from this, but thankfully indeed there were not many. Works, which is. Kent were bowled out to have 135. However, one did not amount. Given that users stood into the outfield and you will basked in the thanks a lot of the 10,000-good audience, Sussex had acquired. We watched as the quick boys in-line to discover the skipper’s autograph – I found myself above all that today – and you can indexed you to definitely Robbo got joined all of them. The guy and Greig was in the future engaged in transferring talk. Each other had been chuckling, thoughts thrown straight back, due to the fact waiting line regarding brief boys longer, shifting anxiously of base to legs. Shortly after what checked an eternity, it shook give warmly and you will Robbo patted his the pal familiarly on the back. He appeared bounding back-up the latest pavilion measures, clutching their closed scorecard – “It is towards center lamb,” he lied – and beaming from ear to ear. “He or she is a soft fantastic bloke.” The sense it absolutely was Greig’s Sussex one acquired the online game is actually palpable. John Spencer, the latest Sussex bowler, explained has just that if Greig took more, the entire environment on a bar “dogged because of the backbiting, cynicism and you may negativity” altered nearly quickly. Greig are an inhale regarding bracing sea air.