On IPL’s big day, two-minute silence for an English amateur, salute to cricket’s unpaid loyalists

Last week The Times, London, carried a heartrending obit of Jonathan Mills, a 55-year-old club cricketer. Written by his brother Daniel, the tribute was for the sales executive of a beauty company for whom cricket wasn’t about playing for his country or county. A passionately committed cricketer, Jonathan’s life and career choices were dictated by season and schedule of his beloved Brookweald Cricket Club.

He scored two hundreds as a long-time opener of the club that, as claimed by its website, happens to be in the prettiest part of Essex, serves the best tea in the league, has its own bar and is the perfect place to spend a sunny Saturday afternoon. It’s in this picturesque surrounding that Jonathan got the final hundred of his life, which according to his brother was straight from the “golden age of schoolboy magazine stories”.

Why remember an English amateur on a day when the game’s two biggest icons face-off in the world’s biggest and glitziest league? The pull of the quaint village cricket greens is eternal but why move away from the floodlights when Mahendra Singh Dhoni could possibly be playing his last serious cricket game and Virat Kohli was psyched to launch the mother of all IPL comebacks?

But in the middle of this wild party of six-hitters, where the once-rare T20 100s are becoming an everyday possibility, it is worthwhile to recall Jonathan’s match winning ‘110 off 123 balls, with a 21 boundaries’ effort for Brookweald CC’s second XI against Woodham Mortimer in the local village league.

Sport, as celebration of life

If runs had weight, this would be among the world’s heaviest ton. Rarely has a knock meant so very much to one person, and the handful around him. Cricket, and even football, is more than life and death for many, we are told. That’s ridiculous, it’s a cliche wrapped around by hyperbole. For Jonathan, cricket for about a year or so was the celebration of his short life, as told to him by his oncologist.

Jonathan Mills was diagnosed with cancer last year. He underwent treatment. However, only last week, he received the news that the treatment didn't work 😔 Despite this 'Millsy' didn't let it get him down. He opened the batting on Saturday and scored 110! A warrior & a legend 💪🏽 pic.twitter.com/D0OJLNLgj3

— Brookweald Cricket Club (@brookweald) June 19, 2023

After six months of aggressive treatment of stage four bowel cancer, Jonathan was told that he was among the 45 per cent in the world who didn’t react to chemotherapy. His tumours were stubborn, instead of shrinking, they had actually grown. Given six months to live, Jonathan said no to palliative chemo and wanted to return to normal life, which for him meant padding up for his club Brookweald. “I got the diagnosis and thought, ‘Well that’s it, might as well get a game in’,” he would later say.

He would reach out to his club and they would whole-heartedly welcome him. Being away from cricket for a while, the sportsman in Jonathan would have guilt pangs. Were his team mates giving him a place in the side out of sympathy? The opener in mid-50s had one more reason to do well. In the limited time on hand, with death said to be creeping towards him, Jonathan wanted to do what he loved the most but not at the cost of his team’s fortunes. The fears were unwarranted, he went on to play an emotional innings that had the power to tug the heart-strings of entire England.

On the pitch, when Jonathan completed his half-century, he and his opening partner Gary Wolfe were in tears. “I got choked up for him at 50, but didn’t think he’d go on to get a hundred to be honest. It really was a special moment. We all felt lucky to be there,” Wolfe would tell The Times. The report mentions the short advice Jon’s partner Sharon had given him., – “Don’t go mad,” he was told. “She knows how important it (cricket) is to me.” By the time he reached hundred, he was drained out, the impact made by the six chemos on the body was showing. He was too tired to even cry.

The picture of Jonathan standing in front of the scoreboard displaying his 110 would go viral. It would get voted as the innings of the season by many websites. Before their game against Kent, Essex would call him to ring the ceremonial pre-game bell. The MCC chairman Stephen Fry would invite him to the Ashes Test at Lord’s. “I’ll go and have a chat with Mr McCullum and see if he needs any tips,” the Bazballing opener Jon would tell BBC Essex’s Around The Wicket.

Jon, along with his twin, turned up at the ground. “Just very occasionally we get to meet people who remind you how special life is and how to squeeze every last drop out of it,” Fry would say. Dressed smartly in a blue shirt and maroon tie, he looked healthy while getting interviewed by Jonathan Agnew for Test Match Special. About a year later, Agnew, a veteran broadcaster who has interacted with virtually the entire cricketing world, would remember his unique guest. “It was a wonderfully inspirational interview, one of those that I’ll never forget,” said Agnew later.

Unseen, unpaid

Jonathan’s death throws the spotlight on cricket’s large army of unseen and unpaid retinues. They could be among your friends or even living next doors. They also have an uncanny knack of propping up in the many sporting fairy tales cricket throws up. They are those who don’t miss weekend games despite aching limbs and rising complaints of neglect from home. They top gully cricket games to bat for a while and later explain the nuance of the game to the kids. They convince parents to send their talented kids to academies. They keep the game alive, keep its narrative richer. In the case of Jonathan, the game stood by its loyal servant. It became the support system when he needed it the most.

There were a couple of poignant Jon comments from the day he raised his bat in defiance. “I thought I would never get to do this again. I feel like I’ve lost this war, but I’m going to try to win a few battles on the way out … I’ve enjoyed myself. Unfortunately my time is my time, so I want to go out smiling.” He did that at the care-home where, according to his obit, he had fino sherry in the fridge, whisky on the sideboard and old teammates and golfing partners around him. Cricket was giving good old Jon something that was more precious than what the IPL winners would walk away home with after the final on May 26.

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