While Christmas may be your cup of eggnog, it’s the day after – Boxing Day – when things get interesting. Take today. As a lover of cricket – real cricket – you should be well into the first day of the 4th Australia-India Test in Melbourne by now. The traditional Boxing Day Test between Australia and a touring team is 56 years old. Regardless of the side you cheer – oh, there has to be some Aussies reading this column – the thrill is two-fold: one, there is joy and excitement aplenty the day after a day of joy and excitement; two, waking up in the wee hours – since match day starts at 5 a.m. and ends before 10 a.m. – is far more exciting, especially on a weekday.
The evening, too, is jam-packed with top-notch spectator sports: 7 games in the Premier League starting with Man City vs Everton at 6 p.m. – with even neutrals waiting to see whether Pep Gardiola’s team can stem their mysterious plummet down the league table – and ending with the last game of the day, the other Manchester team playing against Wolverhampton Wanderers a.k.a. Wolves. Such a glorious sporting day makes Boxing Day a veritable Christmas all by itself – minus the tsunami of ‘revellers’. Between the morning’s cricket and the evening’s football if there is work, surely, you must have developed a nasty cough from yesterday’s night-out on an AQI-high Christmas, right?
