Divine Cricket

Around the time that the first test match between England and South Africa got underway yesterday, the national radio station RNE3 offered something of a cricketing tribute. Not, one imagines, that they for one moment knew anything about the game at Centurion. Nevertheless, there it was – on this most eclectic of Spanish music stations – a song from the “Duckworth Lewis Method” album by the group of the same name (Neil Hannon, The Divine Comedy), with references to getting your pads on and the like.

How big, do you suppose, does a song about cricket play with a Spanish audience? Not very, one would think, especially as the lyrics are of course in English and obscure to any – even to English speakers – who might not understand the cricketing motifs in the song, after which the presenter explained that it came from a concept album about cricket, a sport that no Spaniard would have a clue about. What would have been better, would have been if the presenter had tried to explain the Duckworth Lewis Method to a Spanish audience.