Pink

I am so over this wave of pink that is assaulting my visual senses at present. I am talking the breast cancer pink. Now, don't get me wrong, any disease that has the potential to terminate lives prematurely is no bloody good (especially to the afflicted) and monies needed for research into breast cancer or primary sclerosing cholangitis is urgently needed and very hard to come by. But the current rash of fund raising pink is getting up my nose and interfering with my enjoyment of the summer game.

We started off years ago (in my youth even) with flag days. Poppies are still around but I seem to recall a geranium day in the sixties in the UK. No idea what my not buying a paper geranium was not supporting. Daffodils in August supporting (I think) cancer research. I don't buy those either.

A few years ago it used to be those stupid rubber wrist bands. I think Lance Armstrong started those in support of research into malignancy in gentleman's corset regions; a subject he rightly has considerable interest in. So you would be talking to a bloke attired in a sharp business suit and there would be this piece of tacky yellow rubbery plastic peeking out from under the cufflinks. This all spawned a rash of different coloured wristbands for all manner of 'good causes' which interested me not at all. Most of them didn't even rise to the status of good in my books.

Then we had ribbons. Pink for breast cancer(more of this damned colour in a minute) white for family violence and so on. All these ersatz flowers, wrist bands and ribbons do have a couple of things going for them. You can chose to partake, which I do not as alluded to above, and they are relatively non obtrusive.

Bloody Pink is neither of these things. It has over the last couple of weeks taken over my favourite sport. First we had Northern Districts playing Auckland in the 20-20 in totally pink playing strip. It looked terrible. But it was the 'pyjama game' so we'll move on. But yesterday we had the conclusion of the second Test between Orstralia and the Pakis. A good Test it was as well with only two problems. Problem one was that the Aussies won when the Pakis clutched defeat from the jaws of victory. Second problem was pink. Test cricket is the proper game played in white kit. End of story. Over the years we have had advertising logos creep onto the kit. So you never get a shot of a Pakistan player without seeing both his gold star national emblem and a Pepsi logo. Australia are sponsored by the '3 network' and we have to put up with their fiery three motif on the players shirts. And on the damned pitch filling the entire area between long off and long on. This Test we had a very sporting and appropriate '$29 cap' sprayed onto the ground. You can buy a Three Network hat for $29? I suspect not and it is a pricing plan.

Bad enough? No, it gets worse. All this '3' nonsense was given the pink treatment. All the players logos were pink, the ground spraying was pink. Virtually every boundary hoarding was pink. All bat handles were pink. Even the sodding stumps were pink. You do not play cricket, especially Test cricket using pink stumps. Full stop. Not negotiable.

We get a tea break from the play and a respite from bloody pink. No we don't, it gets worse. We get an interview with Glenn McGrath whose wife's very unfortunate demise was obviously the catalyst of this ghastly colour invasion and he was wearing a pink (admittedly a quite subtle hue) polo shirt. But he was interviewed alongside 'Slates' who was wearing a shocking pink suit (a suit) complete with matching fedora. I have a very nice and not cheap rug in front of the 42" Sony and I do not require a bill to remove vomit from it at this expensive time of year.

Breast cancer is a bad thing (I read it in a book). Bloody pink invading Test cricket is worse.

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