Here at cricket with balls we are going to keep you updated on as much as the women’s world cup as we can. Because we like women’s cricket, well we like Holly Colvin. We even have a roving reporter, DoubleD, who is going to cover the world cup in cricket with balls style. Like all major sporting events, it started with a press conference, and DoubleD interviewed the girls with aplomb.
Entering the Windsor hotel wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. Would there be a throng of media gathering, herded together, Dictaphones’ in hand hanging on every word of the players. This was my first ever attendance at a media open session, I wasn’t even sure if they would let me attend as I wasn’t able to get media accreditation.
After a few wrong turns I found my way to the 2nd floor where the West Indian were spread out in small groups chatting amongst themselves. This was a little more casual than I had expected. There was a table in the middle of the room with some official looking ICC type people sitting there. “Hi my names DoubleD I’m with Cricket with Balls”. To my surprise they seemed to be expecting me. Some guy even apologised for not having my media pass ready. I signed some sort of official looking the sheet as requested, was handed my official media guide and was pretty much left to my own devices.
Now what do I do? After a few minutes shuffling papers and trying to psyche myself up I sheepishly approached the West Indian team manager and requested to speak to some of the players. “Sure no problem, who do you want to speak with?”, again this seemed far too easy. “Ummmm anyone”…
So there I was without any real idea of what I was doing, notepad in hand sitting down with the West Indian Vice Captain, Kirbyina Alexander and Anisa Mohammed.
My questions were all pretty cliché. How long have you been playing cricket? What are your expectations for the tournament? How is the teams form? And the responses were all pretty standard. I did get one interesting response when asked about the impact the collapse of the Sir Alan Stanford Empire has had, Kirbyina responded with “No Comment”. A bit taken aback I chuckled and followed up with, “Did you have money in one of his banks”? Again the response was “No Comment”, “ok then! Well thanks for your time and good luck with the tournament”.
I went back to the media manager to ask some questions about the team line up, where I was then directed to the Coach, Sherwin Campbell. Gee if I’m taller than Sherwin Campbell how short must Gus Logie be?? Again I asked some pretty stock standard questions and he was happy placate me and talk up his teams chances. I thanked him for his time and shook his hand; hmmm you really played 52 test matches?
I saw some English players milling around, with still 20 minutes left on my lunch break I thought I would have a crack.
I approached the ICC official and asked to speak with one of the English players. She came back with Charlotte Edwards.
Speaking with Charlotte Edwards I got the feeling I was 18 years old in a night club trying to pick her up, not that I would have tried, she is a little bit tall for me. Her eyes kept darting around the room looking for someone, anyone to come and save her from my inane questions.
As we began talking I noticed she was occasionally looking at my notepad, probably noticing that I wasn’t writing anything. Hey it’s not easy to speak, write and think of questions at the same time.
You could tell Charlotte was more accustomed to interviews then Kirbyina and Anisa from the West Indians. One issue I wanted to try and engage her on was the way female cricketers are sometimes depicted in glamorous photo shoots. I asked if she felt it was disappointing the female athletes still need to partake in sexy photo shoots.
She played me with a very straight bat. “Oh no I think the girls like getting made up; as long as it’s done tastefully I don’t think it’s a problem”.
I did think that her response to my questions on the team’s goal for the tournament was little too cliché not to mention, “we wouldn’t be here if we didn’t think we could win”, well I don’t think that is quite true. I’m sure the English team would still turn up even if they couldn’t beat the Petersham under twelves.
I thanked Charlotte for her time and wished her all the best and with my very brief notes I headed back to work. I wasn’t that much the wiser but had survived my first open media open session.
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