Cricket News Desk. 9 years ago, the Indian team had toured England in the month of July. This series was to be played only three months after Team India won the World Cup. The cricketers looked all set for the English summer, but the Indian players started faltering in England from the very beginning and the team was losing match after match. Talking about performance, such a bad series has rarely been seen in the history of Indian cricket.
After consecutive defeats in the Test matches at Lord’s, Nottingham, Birmingham and The Oval, the Indian team’s next stop in the series was Manchester. Where both the teams were face to face in the only T20 match of the series. Ajinkya Rahane, who played his first major series against England, batted brilliantly at Old Trafford but once again Team India lost the match.
I remember the ODI series was going to start in Durham on 3rd September. Before the 5-match series, the team management of Team India had requested Rahul Dravid to play the ODI series again. By then Dravid was almost out of limited overs cricket. In such a situation, the scattered Indian team reached Durham two days before the match.
Former all-rounder Manoj Prabhakar was working as a cricket expert in ABP News 9 years ago. Who played cricket for Durham County for many years. Before leaving for England, Manoj Bhai had told me that if you go to Durham, you must visit Lumley Castle Hotel. Earlier the players used to stay in the same hotel in Durham, but after complaints from cricketers of many teams, the England Cricket Board started making arrangements for the players to stay in a separate hotel. Same thing happened with the Indian team and the cricketers stayed in the Royal County Hotel for 4 days.
Just 200 meters from the Chester-le-Street ground, it was a stone-built hotel. The walls and old architecture of this hotel are still unchanged. During the Ashes series in 2005, several Australian players first complained that they had experienced the presence of a ghost in the Lumley Castle Hotel.
All-rounder Shane Watson said that he saw a ghost. Many support staff of the team also started saying such things. England had defeated Australia in this series, even today many cricket lovers say that the Australian players were so scared that they could not play to their potential. After seeing a ghost in the same hotel, some West Indies players also got scared and the matter made headlines in the British media.
Before leaving for England, Manoj Prabhakar told me that the area around the Lumley Castle Hotel in Durham was nice, but by 8 pm. You will know if you go yourself.
My colleague Subir and I also tried to book a hotel but I found that the rooms in this hotel were already booked by tourists from many European countries who wanted to try it as an adventure. Because of this, it is difficult to get a room here at the last moment but the Indian team was against any adventure and already wanted to stay in another hotel.
Before 2005, Indian players also stayed in this hotel several times when they went to play matches in Durham, England. Once it happened that many players could not sleep the whole night. It is said that Lady Lumley was murdered at this very place about 600 years ago. At that time there was a fort here, which was later converted into a hotel.
The first ODI in Durham was canceled due to rain. But Team India could not win a single match in the series. England defeated India 3-0 in the ODI series after losing 4 Test matches and the only T20 match. The players avoided seeing the ghosts by staying in another hotel in Durham, but at a distance of 22 yards, sometimes Anderson, sometimes Stuart Broad and sometimes Tim Bresson came as ghosts and frightened the Indian batsmen badly.
