My wife and I went to watch Australia versus England in the first one-day match of the current series, played at the MCG. We thought we were lucky to find some of the last remaining seats amongst the crowd on the bottom level, hoping to enjoy a few rays of sunshine. Mistakenly, we had sat in the old Bay 13 section, where all rowdy supporters were seated.
The first thing we noticed was a large security and police presence. On the scoreboard, they listed unacceptable behaviour, but I did not read it as it was such a long list! I soon found out some of what was on the list, as people around us, one by one, were kicked out of the ground for breaking the rules.
One of the biggest problems was throwing beach balls. At first, I thought that they were being a bit heavy-handed – what damage can a beach ball do? After my wife was covered with spilled beer and such five times from guys jumping up to hit the balls, I joined the anti-beach ball club.
We also saw around us people who had brought in alcohol, were smoking, and even one guy threw a tennis ball at a player fielding on the boundary, hitting him in the back. All these people were promptly sent home.
To finish it off, in the last overs someone ran onto the field, not quite with all his gear off, and would have found himself given a $6000 fine. An expensive day at the cricket. All-in-all we heard that over 100 people were ejected from the stadium.
What about the cricket? Well, after the break we moved to the quieter upper level and were actually able to watch some of the game. Australia won as expected.
