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England’s Bajan boys Phil Salt and Jacob Bethell had a party of their own in front of family, friends and fans in the first T20I

Cameron Ponsonby10-Nov-2024There’s many reasons why you’re sat reading about the West Indies vs England T20I, and Phil Salt was out there playing it.Talent, for one. Desire, another. And that’s before we mention ability, the coach at Under-13s who didn’t back you and that knee injury you had at 16. You could have made it.But one of the main reasons is because on Thursday, Salt was invited to a party with Rihanna and turned it down in favour of an early night. You choose to have five beers on a Friday with your mate who works in finance and says “inflation” every other word, Salt chooses not to hang out with one of the world’s most successful and talented mega stars even with 48 hours to spare to pop a Berocca or two.Related

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“Rihanna’s parties can wait,” Salt joked after the game.It is, objectively, the wrong decision and one might think less of Salt as a result. When the new era of player welfare came in, where they were asked to prioritise themselves as much as the game, this is what they were talking about. Going to parties with pop stars. Not golf.But he did score a century. So there’s that.On a genuinely wonderful evening at Kensington Oval, Salt, who spent part of his childhood here, registered his third hundred in five matches against West Indies, while Jacob Bethell, for whom Barbados is home, registered his maiden T20I fifty in front of a crowd that appeared to be 90% friends and family.The Bajan boys did the business for England. Both of them played their cricket for Harrison College down the road, a school where Bethell was a pupil, while Salt was a loanee, attending a nearby private school but being released on daycare to play cricket.Salt himself described Kensington Oval as the ground he has watched the most cricket at through his youth. The tale of him watching Paul Collingwood carry the T20 trophy past him in 2010 is well trodden for a reason. This place means something to him and when he reached three figures, the outpouring of emotion spoke to that.”I don’t get very emotional on the cricket field,” he said afterwards. “But that’s as close as I’ve come I think for so many reasons. That’s number one for me.”Jacob Bethell scored his first T20I fifty in front of a crowd that looked 90% friends and family•Getty ImagesA lifelong Manchester City fan, Salt added, “It’s something you can’t really put into words without wanting to sound too cheesy. That’s what you dream of as a kid. That is the cricket equivalent of the 30-yard screamer at Maine Road in the 89th minute.”Barbados is a small place. As of 2023, the population stood at 282,000. So when one of their own takes to the field people know about it. Salt has played here for England many times, but for Bethell it was a first.His school coach, Corey Edwards, a former Barbadian seamer, said he knew Bethell was destined for the top from the beginning. While Barry Wilkinson, a local commentator, remembered Bethell from when he was three years old and described watching him walk out at Kensington Oval as the closest thing to “watching his son” do the same. Whether he would play at this ground as an international cricketer seems of less debate than who it would be for. Wilkinson always thought it would be for West Indies, Edwards wasn’t so sure.Regardless, the locals supported both as their own. Mainly because they are.”There was a turning point in the chase where we could both sort of feel the crowd had turned and were now supporting us,” Salt said of their partnership.”Is that his old school?” Salt asked, looking over to a throng of supporters still in the stands supporting their friend. “Good on him, I love that. I’m more pleased for him than I am myself right now, seeing that. There’s a lot of happy people with smiling faces there, it was Beth’s first 50 on this ground.”Phil Salt made his third T20I century, all of them in the Caribbean•Getty ImagesFor Salt, his innings added to his incredible record against West Indies. In his last five matches against them, he has made three centuries and scored 456 runs at an average of 228 with a strike rate of 193.The three centuries represent his only in T20I cricket and one of the two innings where he didn’t reach three figures was an 87 not out in the World Cup. On the surface, asking Salt what the secret sauce against these lot appears to be a dull question, it is surely a coincidence, but it is one he has wondered himself.”The secret is there is no secret,” he said. “I had a look into it to see if there is anything I could take in other places in different conditions and there really wasn’t that much. It just seems to be that I’ve played a bit better here, that’s it.”On paper, it was a routine victory for England. But everywhere you looked across the evening there was entertainment to hand. Andre Russell launching Liam Livingstone onto the roof and out of the stadium before being caught next ball. Jos Buttler snaring a one-handed catch at slip before being caught even more preposterously by Gudakesh Motie at third for a golden duck. Motie himself walking out at 117 for 8 and blazing his first two balls for sixes. It was full throttle, played out in front of an invested, passionate crowd that was evenly split between tourists and locals. If there is a way to watch cricket that is better than a T20 on a Saturday night in Bridgetown, I’m yet to see it.But even after all that, you’d think you’d still rather party with Rihanna on a Thursday.

MEYBA are back and have cooked up a third collaboration with The Beatles, completing a trilogy which brings together football, music, art and culture. They've already achieved great success together with two previous drops, and for their final act in this series, they have gone all in to bring back the spirit of Yellow Submarine, one of the world's very first cross-platform successes.

MEYBAThree new football shirts – £65

The collection features three new football shirts, coming hot off MEYBA's drops honouring Abbey Road and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. The extra distinction with Yellow Submarine is its wider cultural impact, with its psychedelic colour scheme and popping visuals coming from the animated film of the same name in 1968, two years after the release of the album.

Yellow Submarine is widely credited with the boom in vibrant art styles seen in animation for the decades that followed. MEYBA has sought to stay true to that in this modern reboot, with each football shirt a tribute to locations within the film. The black-and-white number represents the Sea of Holes, while the titular submarine and the Blue Meanies are instantly recognisable with their associated palettes.

AdvertisementMEYBAFour graphical t-shirts – £45

Accompanying the football shirts for this drop are limited edition graphical t-shirts, adorned with either an 'All You Need Is Love' quote or the idiosyncratic submarine in a reversed colour scheme.

Though the main palettes on these t-shirts are perhaps less exciting, coming in white, black and grey, the contrast to the funkier colours of the graphics themselves make them stand out from the crowd in true late-sixties Beatles fashion.

MEYBABespoke varsity jacket – £150

Talk about a coveted piece of merch. This stunning varsity jacket features caricatures of the band's four members – John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr – on jet black sleeves, with the deep blue of the Blue Meanies again featuring on the body. A Yellow Submarine patch appears with the MEYBA logo on the front, with another cartoon of the band all together on the back.

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MEYBAMEYBA's journey, collaborations and future

MEYBA, once one of Spain's most revered sportswear producers and Barcelona's partner when they won their first European Cup in 1992, have been busy making football shirts fit for all sorts of cross-cultural purposes, from festivals to food to music and more.

Jonathan Jones, MEYBA's Head of Global Marketing, said: "This collection represents everything MEYBA stands for – creativity, nostalgia, and cultural storytelling through football design. Yellow Submarine allowed us to blur the lines between sport, art, and music in a joyful, playful way."

It's only fitting that the trilogy wraps up with a Spanish brand honouring a piece of art called Yellow Submarine, given that is the nickname of one of the country's most successful teams and Champions League side Villarreal, who hail from a community town of around 50,000 people.

This is, however, not the end of MEYBA's return to football or their adventures dipping into other cultures and mediums, with an exciting future still in their sights having agreed deals with clubs all over the world.