da cassino：
da leao： 08-Jan-2006Castle Park is, by far and away, the most attractive of thegrounds used by Essex County Cricket Club. Lying to the north ofthe High Street, and below the level of the town and castleitself, the park is bordered by the remains of the Romanperimeter wall and the old Colchester by-pass. During ColchesterCricket Week, the park is transformed by the sudden arrival oftiered seating, the ubiquitous blue and white marquees and, ofcourse, the mobile scoreboard. The pavilion is quite an elegantbuilding, backed by trees through which the tower of theVictorian town hall peeps, spire-like, in the distance. Throughthe park runs the willow-lined River Colne, beautiful enough, butresponsible for most of the ground’s considerable drainageproblems.Colchester Cricket Week is held in August. In the past, thefestival has been bedevilled by bad weather, so much so that in1966, it was transferred, in the middle of a match, toColchester’s secondary venue, the Garrison Cricket Ground. Thisarrangement lasted until 1975, at which point the club,presumably worried more by falling attendance than a certain G.Boycott’s knack of scoring double centuries on the Garrisonwicket or the unattractive nature of the Garrison ground itself,decided that a return to Castle Park was overdue. Despite thesnow which disrupted a match against Kent in early June, the moveproved to be a wise one. Essex have an impressive record atCastle Park, having won, or at least drawn, most of the matchesthat have been played there.Castle Park has seen more than its fair share of centurions ofboth varieties. It has been the scene of several notablecricketing achievements. When Essex entertained Kent atColchester in 1938, A.E. Fagg became the only batsman ever, tohit a double century in each innings, scoring 244 in his firstand 202 in his second. Even Graham Gooch, with his famous triplecentury against India at Lord’s in 1990, cannot boast acomparable achievement.Ken McEwan, always a prolific scorer, hit five hundreds in fourconsecutive visits to Castle Park between 1981 and 1984. Hesurpassed himself in 1983, scoring 181 against Gloucestershireand then, in the same week, 189 against Worcestershire, on bothoccasions securing a comfortable victory for his adoptive county.Javed Miandad also has good cause the remember Castle Park. In1981, after Glamorgan had secured a first innings lead, a centuryeach from Gooch and Hardie allowed Essex to declare their secondinnings at 411 for 9. Undeterred at being set 325 runs in almostexactly the same number of minutes, Javed Miandad raced away to200 not out and it was only when he ran out of partners, some 14runs short of the required total, that Essex and a nervous crowdof supporters could breathe freely again.
