Many have come to Rome seeking spiritual guidance: Thomas à Becket, Lord Byron, Lionel Richie. I came for a different purpose: to defend a papal cricket trophy. I am not Catholic. And until last year I had never played cricket before.
It all started, as many great British stories do, with a pub: the Three Stags in Kennington. My friend Tom had invited me to what he described as a ‘Cricket Club Party’. As I headed upstairs, the barman’s quizzical look when I mentioned I was there for ‘the party’ should have given me cause for concern. As I came in through the doors, I was greeted by what appeared to be the end of a Sunday lunch and a collection of six individuals for whom the collective age would have been a record-setting Test score. The only exception was Tom (28) who excitedly rushed over to tell me how delighted he was that I was here for the ‘Emeriti Cricket AGM’.
I was hustled to the table and squeezed in between two elderly gentlemen, one of whom was halfway through a roast beef lunch and the other whom I managed to immediately offend with a joke about the north. While the chairman or president or some other functionary (I missed his intro as I was still apologizing for the joke) began to outline the history of the club and its great outreach work with Catholic schools, I realized I was in unfamiliar waters. When the roast beef gentleman asked about my Catholic credentials, I said that I went to school in the shadow of a Catholic church. That would technically have been true if the church had been slightly larger and the shadow slightly longer. Thankfully, we were interrupted by a vote to ratify the upcoming season’s schedule, including a match against the Vatican XI at Douai Abbey.
The Vatican XI, officially St Peter’s Cricket Club, was established in 2013, at the suggestion of Australia’s ambassador to the Holy See, to promote interreligious, ecumenical and intercultural dialogue through cricket. Players are drawn from the large number of priests and seminarians studying in Rome, who are immediately recognizable in their yellow team blazers emblazoned with the crossed keys of St Peter. The team has undertaken several international ‘Light of Faith’ tours, embracing Pope Francis’s message to go to the peripheries of the world. Although I’m not sure ‘Douai Abbey’ was quite what he had in mind.
And so it was that weeks later, newly christened as a member of the Emeriti, I found myself at Paddington station with the other disciples. We were a rag-tag bunch dressed in a combination of official team gear, Lillywhites’ finest Slazenger and linen suit trousers. With Tom and his better–looking brother Alec leading the way, we piled on to the train two by two, heading to our first match.
I had been laboring under the illusion that our opposition would consist primarily of elderly Italian clergymen with as thorough an understanding of cricket as I had of Catholic doctrine. But the Vatican team was made up almost entirely of young seminarians from Kerala, the state which has produced Sanju Samson, one of India’s most talented batsmen, and S. Sreesanth, one of its most fearsome fast bowlers.
I had hoped that hovering in the outfield, offering moral support would be my sole contribution for the tournament, until I was told in no uncertain terms that I would be bowling the next over. As I approached the stumps, the umpire asked me which side of the wicket I wished to bowl around. ‘Which would you recommend?’ I replied. Despite his appalled look, I found international bowling to be rather simpler than expected. My first wicket I attribute to divine inspiration. The second was a miracle ball. The third was probably heresy. (Wicketkeeper Jimothy called it out. But I’m not sure it was.)
I can’t claim credit for our win. That accolade falls to the far more competent members of the team including Captain Seb, Alec, who scored 119 not out, and Lily, who bowled exceptionally in her Emeriti debut. But as the sun set on Douai Abbey, we all gleefully raised the Pope Leo XIV Trophy as a coin blessed by the Pope himself was pressed into our hands.
Twelve months later, we were summoned to Rome for a return fixture with the Vatican XI. We arrived at the magnificent grounds of Roma Capannelle, the Appian Way only a bouncing four away. For the past year we had been training religiously. In other words, most of us had done no training and were merely praying for the best.
We were alarmed to see the opposition bolstered by the mentorship of the living cricket legend Francis ‘Alfonso’ Jayarajah, Italy’s first ever cricket captain and one of the founders of the Vatican club. Standing on the boundary, hydrating with an Aperol Spritz, I began to wonder if last year’s win had made us overconfident.
As we insisted on fielding in the style of Venus de Milo, more runs were added to the Vatican tally
The Vaticaners bowled with pace and precision, delivering balls that would have made St Sebastian wince. But with Tom and Alec leading from the front, we reached a commendable total of 171 at the end of 20 overs. As the Vatican headed in to bat, I wondered whether we should do the gentlemanly thing and let them get up a respectable total to keep the game close? Wasn’t that the English thing to do?
But any sentimentality I’d harbored about our opponents evaporated as the ball disappeared in the direction of the Roman ruins. As we insisted on fielding in the style of Venus de Milo, more and more runs were added to the Vatican tally and I feared that any hopes of victory were slipping through our grasp.
In the final overs the match hung in the balance, with the Vatican stacking sixes but only one precarious wicket remaining. It looked certain that our downfall was imminent until the bowling of Alec produced a high ball that his brother Tom caught with the light-fingered touch that has earned him fame across Guildford.
The Saints were sent marching in, the supporters rushed on with Capannelle service station’s finest pre-mixed Aperol, and I wondered how the English attitude of ‘it’ll be all right on the night’ had managed to work yet again. Credit must also be given to the other Emeriti and the supporters, old and new, without whom the win and the Aperol would not have tasted so sweet. My own contributions were pedestrian.
The following morning, sitting in Mass alongside the rest of the team, and hearing the Lord’s song in a strange land, I wondered if, like many Englishmen who’d made the journey before me, I had been called to Rome for a greater purpose. For now though, I was content with one miracle. We’d won.
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