A bloomin' good time

Cricket can sometimes be a bed of roses

There was more than one purple patch at Nevill Ground in Tunbridge Wells that day Adrian Murrell / © Getty Images

There's a fair bit of fauna about the cricket - dogs are a hot favourite, birds, not so much - but won't someone think about the flora? Cricket and horticulture have a long and storied relationship - and we don't mean the one between Andy and Grant.

There's the war of the roses, between Yorkshire's white and Lancashire's red. Southampton's Rose Bowl has changed many names but no one's calling it anything else. And, of course, the South Africans' wear their sugarbushes aka proteas proudly.

One of the most iconic World Cup innings of all time was made all the more striking by the backdrop - Kapil Dev's 175 against Zimbabwe in 1983 that unfurled before Tunbridge Wells' flaming purple rhododendrons.

Village cricket in England, already painfully picturesque, is made prettier still by the blooming canola flowers in Knipton in Leicestershire in the photo below.

It was all yellow: a sight to inspire Coldplay © Getty Images

India can well hold its own on the floral front - can England compete with cricket played in the long grass under fragrant almond blossoms in Kashmir?

Things that go bloom: Kashmir's almond blossoms could rival Japan's sakura season © Getty Images

In the subcontinent, you want to make an impression, you say it with flowers. From garlands for returning heroes, like MS Dhoni after India's 2007 T20 World Cup win...

Dhoni this: MS replaces the burden of captaincy with another © Getty Images

To larger-than-life replicas of trophies, because a win by any other name would smell as sweet.

A World Cup for India: wilt they, won't they? Idrees Mohammed / © AFP/Getty Images

When Neil Fairbrother and Peter Martin found themselves in Ahmedabad for the 1996 World Cup opener, which fell on Valentine's day, they had to scramble to find a date.

She's mine, bud: Fairbrother and Martin attempt to woo a fan John Giles / © PA Photos/Getty Images

Rachael Heyhoe Flint, England's World Cup-winning captain and later journalist and broadcaster, received an unusual gift for her 40th birthday for her contributions to cricket - geraniums that would carry her name.

Heyhoe, let's grow: the former England captain holds up the geraniums named after her © Getty Images

South Africa proudly wear their national flower, the protea, on their jerseys and in their team name. Some fans take that love a little further.

Vase and means: a fan turns himself into a human protea bouquet Themba Hadebe / © Associated Press

Mark Butcher heard talking to plants can make them grow better and faster. So he wondered what singing to them might do.

Butcher's killing them softly with his song Laurence Griffiths / © Getty Images

Deepti Unni is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.

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