Sarasota International Cricket Club plays for the memories

You have not felt true fear until a 5.75 ounce cricket ball whizzes by your head and you don’t have time to move, or even think about moving.

I had not either, until Dec. 10, when I went out to the Sarasota International Cricket Club to take in a match. The club invited me onto the playing field to take pictures during its match against Lakewood Ranch, which was nice of them, but also terrifying. Club president Richard Lawrence, a Sarasota resident, pointed out the best spot for me to stand: directly in line with the batsman.

The club assured me that it would be safe, as long as I paid attention and stayed mobile. I stood behind a wicket, which went up to about my knees, and crouched low to protect as much of my body as possible.

The first few bowls were hit short and did not reach me. The next few were hit harder, but to my right. So far, so safe.

The next bowl, a loud crack rang out on contact. I heard a “whoosh” enter my left ear and felt it snake down my spine, leaving chills in its wake.

Never had I so badly wanted to trade in my Nikon for my old baseball glove, purely for protection’s sake.

That’s when I looked around and had a realization: The fielders weren’t using gloves, either, besides the wicket-keeper (cricket’s version of a catcher). Just bare hands. Cricket balls don’t leave the bat at quite the speed of a baseball, but they are heavier, and I’d imagine trying to catch a line-drive in cricket could leave your fingers stinging, or worse.

Besides watching my life flash before my eyes, the match was a great time. One of the things I love about baseball is the pace of the game allows for lots of chatter, between teammates and rivals. During the cricket match, that same chatter was present. None of it was meant to insult (that would go against the Spirit of Cricket, the preamble to the game’s laws). Instead, it was lighthearted fun.

Rudi Kleer hails from South Africa, but has lived in Sarasota for 17 years. He moved here for work, selling packaging machines. He fell in love with the game as a child. His school had a cricket field, and every summer he and his friends would play for days, creating a bond. That bond is what motivated him to seek out a club in the area.

“The camaraderie and the friendships. That goes beyond everything else, " Kleer said. "I’m not the greatest cricket player, but I enjoy the sport. There’s just so many anecdotes and remembrances and stuff like that. These are my friends, here, at the cricket club. I’ve got a couple of other friends, but these are the guys I like to hang out with.

“We’re just happy to be out here and glad that we can play the sport that we played as kids.”

Kleer is an example of how learning a sport at a young age can create a lifelong love and passion. After the cricket match ended, and the teams went into the clubhouse for homemade curry and beer, two young children took the field with a ball and a bat. Srihaan Dhinesh, 6, and Michael Miles Anderson, 5, were taking turns bowling the ball to each other and letting rip big swings of the bat.

They were using all their might to try and hit the ball clear out of the field of play. They usually missed. That’s OK. After each bowl, they would scream and run and tackle each other, content to play the game their way.

I never learned cricket, but after seeing how much it means to its players, I’m happy the next generation seems to be taking a shine to it. Hopefully, in 30 years, Dhinesh and Anderson will have made as many memories on the field as the club members silently watching them from afar with smiles on their faces.