How I tried – and failed – to get the better of the Barmy Army

2 hours ago 1

I was prepared for the Barmy Army.

I actually felt like I over-prepared, to be honest.

But watching cricket is a game of key moments and, when you’re too distracted by the Archbishop of Canterbury tipping a beer over your head to stop a random bloke with a Three Lions tattoo shoving a wet willy in your ear, the circumstances can get to your decision-making ability.

There’s only so much you can do when the Archbishop of Canterbury is pouring a beer on your head.

Throughout this beautifully ill-fated Ashes tour, it has seemed that the worse England’s cricketers go, the harder, louder and probably drunker the Barmy Army gets.

But sitting among them for a couple of very rare and unfortunate sessions, when the Poms can’t seem to do anything wrong, it becomes painfully clear that’s not the case – the 3500-strong army had just been warming up for Boxing Day.

By the time Cameron Green was run out, sections of the Barmy Army were already looser than a Brydon Carse pitch map, and the joy and beer spilling out into the walkways was infectious (though here’s hoping whatever was on the end of the finger shoved in my ear at that moment was not).

On the field, England have been so poor that former captain Michael Vaughan has described the current Ashes tour as “the worst I can remember in Australia”, but for Barmy Army general manager Chris Millard, it couldn’t be going any better.

“It doesn’t matter if England were the worst team in the world, the best team in the world, I honestly think the numbers would still be strong because people love being part of the Barmy Army,” Millard said.

“I think it’s still something that the Aussies can’t understand – why the worse the England team get, the louder the Barmy Army is.

“It’s a unique British cultural thing, that we all support us through thick and thin.

“When the times are tough, we’ll be there and, when times are good, we’ll also be there.”

The Barmy Army celebrates one of the 10 Australian wickets to fall.

England’s big-talking Bazballers were so good at conning their supporters into thinking they were a chance that 3500 have flown out to join the Barmy Army’s official tour. Though up to 40,000 England fans are expected to jump on board with the group’s activities in Melbourne this week.

On Christmas Day, 1500 attended the Barmy Army Christmas lunch at Crown, and its official merchandise – which can be paid for in English pounds or Aussie dollars– is selling quicker than its top order fell in the afternoon session.

Charlie Chaplin (Colin Bloomfield) says he’ll never abandon the team, no matter how badly they play.

Dressed as Charlie Chaplin, Colin Bloomfield has become a Barmy Army institution across six Ashes tours and has seen it all before. After Alex Carey’s wicket, Bloomfield took to the aisle between bays 12 and 13 to lead the Barmy Army chant for an ear-splitting five minutes, but speaking over a beer in his seat soon after, he was far from getting ahead of himself.

“We’re used to losing five-nil,” Bloomfield said. “We follow the team, we back the team and follow them through thick and thin … Unfortunately, on this tour, it’s been more thin than thick.

“But we’re better than that, and in the last game in Adelaide we showed a little bit more bottle, and they’re putting a little bit of a fight on here.

“A lot of people have come out from the UK just for these two Tests, and I think the players accept that, and they really put in an effort.”

Milo (AKA the Archbishop of Canterbury) and his Beefeater mates Charlie, Matt, Paddy and Henry are among those who have flown out from London to reinforce England’s ranks for the Melbourne and Sydney Tests, assured they’d at least be coming out to cheer on a live series, if not an Ashes series win.

England won’t get the Ashes, but their supporters are having a hell of a lot of fun.

“The chance of being three-nil worried us when we booked our tickets a year ago, but obviously we couldn’t get a refund. So we’re out here, we’re enjoying it,” Milo said.

“It would be better if we were winning, but we’re here for the guys and we’re we’re here for the sun and the beers. So we’re happy.

“We just a bit annoyed that this [beer] is only 3.5 per cent. That’s the only thing holding us back.”

Milo and his mates needn’t have worried. A moment later, when the Cam Green runout happens, they found the perfect place to stick their mid-strength was over my head.

It’s a moment of celebration for them, and a good lesson for me: you can prepare for the Barmy Army all you want but, as rubbish as England is on the field, the Barmy Army always makes the most of its moments.

Grant McArthur finds the worse England performs, the louder the Barmy Army becomes.

Even better, my hat and shirt had barely dried before the Poms were five wickets down and the cricket world had righted itself.

But if anyone thought the Barmy Army was about to shut up, they must have had something far more than an Englishman’s finger shoved in their ear.

As each wicket fell, the army only got louder, leaving their seats and flooding the aisles and standing room in celebration of who-knows-what. And, with so many wickets falling, the noise by the end of day one was absolutely deafening.

Australia may win the Ashes on the field, but it’s impossible to stand up to the Barmy Army off it – and it’s stupid – but fun – to try.

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