How’s your week been? It’s been another busy one for me as August draws to a close.
 
I was fortunate to be at Headingley this week to watch events unfold in England’s favour in this summer’s pulsating series against India.

It certainly made a change from the hosts’ miserable failure on day five at Lord’s at the finale of the second Test. The difference between day one of the Third Test and events last week during the previous match in NW8 was stark.
 
This week was the first time I’d been to Headingley. I’d always wanted to go, but time and circumstance dictated against it over the years. But, finally making it to the fabled ground meant I’d made it to 14 out of the 18 county grounds.
 
I’d been due to go to this inimitable ground in 2012. It was on the Saturday when Kevin Pietersen hit his incredible 149* against the South Africans in 2012 at the height of his travails, but the pal I was due to go with pulled out, and I didn’t want to make the 400-mile round trip by myself. I should have done. I’d never make that mistake again.
 
I’d also wanted to go during the 2019 Ashes but never got round to sorting out tickets, so I missed out on one of the most incredible Test matches ever, featuring one of the most incredible innings, when Ben Stokes hit that never-to-be-forgotten 135 not out in England’s winning total of 362-9. When, as a sign outside the Yorkshire ground rightly mentioned, Dom Bess made his vital 1 not out.
 
So, it felt like I was due a bit of luck in seeing a spot of enthralling Test cricket in West Yorkshire. Thankfully, that turned out to be the case.
 
You could tell something magical was happening on the first day when a burly bearded gentleman wearing a bright pink cheerleader’s outfit, complete with hairy knees over bobby socks, rushed back from the bar just after lunch.
 
The guttural roar from the crowd was another giveaway. There’s no more exciting spectacle to be had than during a Test collapse.

Wickets are hard-earned currency so when the domino effect takes place — either through inept batting or incisive bowling, or both — to be present at such an event is a rare old thing, and one that is thoroughly enjoyable. So long as it’s not your own team. That happened to England during most of the Tests I watched during the late 1980s and ’90s.
 
When the Indian wickets started tumbling, the atmosphere was as loud as it was joyous, as boisterous as it was lusty. In total six wickets fell for 22 runs, four batters returned to the iconic but curiously angular shaped pavilion, for no runs at all at one stage. It was wonderful theatre as England bowled India out for a scarcely credible 78.
 
At Headingley, the Yorkshire identity is everywhere. From the Dickie Bird clock and the White Rose shaped floodlights, to the whitewashed electrics box outside the turnstiles on the Kirkstall Lane end, hailing the already legendary 2019 match winning Ashes partnership between Ben Stokes and Dom Bess. It simply reads: “Stokes 135 Leach 1.”
 
But nothing underlines the Yorkshire spirit than the fearsome Western Terrace. In full throaty roar, it is a sight to behold, as it was on Wednesday when the wickets tumbled. Or, on Thursday, when captain and true Yorkie Joe Root hit his 23rd Test century, his sixth this year and his third in three matches.
 
Headingley, I salute you.
 
Before the end of the first day’s play, I ducked out to make the two-hour trip to the Hawthorns to watch Arsenal beat West Brom 6-0, which included Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s treble.