September 01, 2008	Monday	Sha'aban 29, 1429

SYDNEY, Aug 31: England’s cricket legend Geoffrey Boycott makes no bones when he describes his excruciating battle with cancer. Boycott discovered a lump in his neck while shaving and in September 2002 his doctor told him it was cancer. “Cancer treatment tough? It’s horrific. It’s sort of treatment that reduces strong men to tears. And it did me. Many a time,” Boycott was quoted as saying in The Sunday Telegraph.

“I was so full of morphine I kept falling asleep. And then, when I woke, the relentless pain was still there. But in the end there are just two of you in that match: you and bloody cancer.

“I would count my treatments like I once counted my runs. I had to have 35 laser sessions. ‘Just get to 18,’ I’d will myself, ‘then you’ll be on home run.’ You have to be mentally strong to keep crying and depression at bay. And all the time, through all this pain and fog, there is this niggling question at the back of your mind: will it work?”

Boycott, now 67 and once one of England’s greatest batsmen, was among lucky ones. Three months ago he received all-clear from cancer. The aggressive, fast-growing tumour on his tongue has gone and his prognosis is good.—Agencies