Political Correctness

I run the local Cricket Club's 5th Team and I got this letter last week. I don't think it is genuine, but you never know!

10 Downin Street London SW1 2RAC
Dear Mr or is it 'Comrade' Alderson
It has come to the Prime Minister's attention that Middletin CC 5ths, sometimes known as 'The Pinko Shrimpers' has developed a Left Wing bias to its fixtures with the inclusion of Bulleaton Labour Club. I am writing to you as Protagonist-in Chief , filmed as you were by Sky TV presenting Dave, I mean Ed, Milliband with a bottle of appropriately poor quality champagne in your attempts to gerrymander your council into granting you planning permission for your new pavilion.

Mr Cameron is considering the cancellation of your East Malling fixture because of your team's past infiltration of The East Malling Research Centre. We hold your player Mr Steve Clarkson, no relation thankfully to David's mate Jeremy who would never make such an ass of himself, entirely responsible for the strawberry virus

spreading through the raspberry crop. MI5 have him on video holding a cane and gobbing cherry stones towards the raspberries, to the accompanying sound of his wife ' Red Debs' shouting 'Go on Steve, Higher! Higher!' Your club is very fortunate indeed to prevent publication of the incident under the headline 'DEB's DELIGHT AT CHERRY LOST BY RASPBERRY BLOWER'S MAULING'
Despite our attempts to influence your team to pursue excellence, etiquette and decorum by cajoling clubs in Tonbridge and Tunbridge Wells to include you in their fixture lists I note that your captain Brendan Copps refuses to wear the Gravesend CC Designer Wear kit, choosing instead to wear that provocative red rag of a bull cap of his. Since appointing Mr Copps to further club office you can tell your Chairman Mr Pat Harlow that he has as much chance of carrying the Olympic Torch through Gravesend as there is of hearing something pleasant said by Sid from the Bowls Club.

I have read your so called book 'French and Spanish Cricket for Beginners' (Downloadable from Amazon.co.uk) and I am appalled at your antipathy towards the Bank Teams, in particular HSBC. To accuse their management of cheating is a slap in the face to those institutions that have done so much in the recent past for our country and does no credit to you, and you can inform Mr Verinder Bhoombla that as with all banks HSBC will continue to give no credit to you.

The Cabinet in its next COBRA meeting intends to impose an 'Exclusion Area' on your team preventing you from further polluting the fertile fields of Kent, the County known as 'The Garden of England'. You will be restricted to Clubs in the Gravesham area though there is no need to play Gravesham Cricket Club as it is already Really Really well manured.

The Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has asked me to report your player Ben Williams to the ECB for taking a series photographs of you slip fielders dropping catch after catch and then attaching them on the door of Gravesend Conservative Club with the logo underneath 'The NHS is equally safe in our hands'. Because of this we will be instructing the doctor and the dentist who play for you to withdraw from your team. This will particularly affect occasional 5th team players Mr Steve Dutton who pulls at least 2 muscles per game and Mr Ian Obie who spits teeth every time he has an lbw decision turned down.
The Home Secretary, Theresa May, who is under enough pressure at the moment, has asked me to complain on her behalf about receiving long, rambling and tedious e-mails from a Mr Bob James. Mr James has been continually complaining that his performance has been hampered by the fact that he has to use a second hand bat with holed gloves and has developed a twitch from having to adjust his trousers to secure his box and thigh pad even as the bowler runs in. Mr James has explained that he is unable to replace the faulty items as he is prevented from shopping at 'Wickets', the 'All Year Round Cricket Suppliers in Pelham Rd South to take advantage of his 10% reduction as it only opens on Saturday afternoons when he is playing and on Wednesdays from 10am to 2pm when he is still selecting his side.

On a positive note the Prime Minister is pleased to see that cricket fixtures will continue during the Olympic Games. Be assured that there should be no problem as far as selection is concerned as I have yet to meet anyone outside of Parliament who has got any tickets. May I reiterate what Seb Coe has said that this is entirely due to the unprecedented demand for tickets and is not because of the 10,000 FBI agents and the 2000 soldiers manning the surface to air missiles required to protect the American Team and certainly not because of the seats allocated to minor Royals, Investment Bankers and corrupt officials of the various sporting bodies and all other Old Etonians who are not part of the above.

Finally No. 10 has noted the presence of Mr Matthew Walker at your AGM and would take this opportunity to warn him as he considers his future years not to become a member of the 5ths. To Be or not to Be may be his question but this should be superceded by the Question MBE or not MBE. No doubt Mr Walker will be looking to follow other cricketers such as Phil Tufnell, Darren Gough and Mark Ramprakash to appear on Celebrity or Reality Television. I would point him in the direction of The soon to be on air 'Boris Island, Get me out of here.' With its flight path just a couple of hundred feet above the Bat & Ball I would suggest that any further monies from the ECB should be spent on Ear Muffs, Calm Down Dear shatter proof tea cups and . It's an ill wind-At least the number of ducks per game will rise to the level achieved by the 5ths.

You have been warned

Yours truly

Rupert Merde d'Oc

I was once a Hacker

Okay, I admit it-I've been caught out. It may not be the best of photographs, but it shows what happened to my putter. What is now considered to be criminal behaviour took place on nine hole courses in 1999. Leeds Castle, Lullingstone, Wrotham Heath and Deangate Ridge. I can't think of the other five but I would like them taken into consideration, Your Honour. I felt bad about it; I tried to go straight but I couldn't help myself. I hacked my way round using only a nine iron. Even when a friend took me to one of the Sandwich Courses ( I think it was the second course )I got myself into a pickle. By George, I remember now, it was the first course. Like how I felt, it was a sort of toad-in-the-hole.


I needed to cover it up,before I made a meal of it. I used the excuse that I was fed up with birthday and Christmas presents being almost entirely golf related. I'd already carpeted our lounge with green baize and like me it couldn't take any more. As you know, Your Honour, I can write enough balls without Father Christmas depositing more down the chimney. I had to get rid of the evidence knowing that one day there would be an enquiry. Realizing that there was nobody to grass me up I turned to the the lawn mower. It was a Mountfield Petrol self-fulfilling Prophecy model. Terrific engine; shame about the handles. Manoeuvring around the apples and pears did for them. I needed a long term solution. As my short game was as bad as my hacking I could see a connection. I swung into action attaching my 3 put putter to the mower's bracket to keep it shut. Momentarily I regretted not having one of those sit-on mowers as I had a spare driver. I wedged the other side. I admit I was flagging. I even told the missus after a bit of foreplay, where to go when she said she needed a cup of tees. As a matter of fact I didn't mean to be so harsh but I didn't want her to become a golfing accessory.


There is a point to all this. Did I hear on the Radio this morning that the Times had been accused of Hacking into E-Mails? Maybe this is why the Sunday Times hasn't dealt with the matter brought up in the E-Mail I tried to send them after reading an article in the Travel Section last Sunday. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt as they probably haven't hacked in yet to how hacked off I feel about it. For those of you who haven't hacked in to my Hard Drive:-



I am trying to make a comment for the benefit of the author of the article with regard to no.1 in his 100 best holidays 'Take The Plunge' published in the 'Travel' section of The Sunday Times yesterday. I did go to thesundaytimes.co.uk/travel, but I seemed to be redirected to registering online which I don't want to do. My apologies for burdening you. I need to tell him that our then 18 year son leapt off the Pont du Diable at Thueyts into the River Ardèche below in 1999 fracturing his sternum. He most certainly would have drowned if it were not for his brave friend who jumped in to pull our unconscious son from the water. Thanks to the help of many others, some who knew him, some who didn't, some whose job it was and some whose job it wasn't, he made a full recovery. I can remember the Doctor at the hospital in Valence to which my son had been taken in an air ambulance asking me as I held his hand in intensive care why youngsters do it. I didn't have the Language to tell him that like the French he was untrammelled by our health-and-safety culture.

Thank you for your time

Best wishes

Mike Kelleher

Mr/Mrs/Ms/ Har Haaarrrggghhh

England 14-0, after the bowlers docked the tail in clinical fashion. Part of the tail is now in a spin trying to remove the openers.Cook is struggling. Ajmal the destroyer is coming on. Will the England players have long enough to study his action or will they leave that to Bob Willis. As oldies we have got tickets for one of the 'London Prepares' Diving sessions for a fiver. We are looking forward to seeing another Olympic venue from an insider's point of view. This is despite the memory of a near fatal diving accident for our son, which may leave us uncomfortable in our pre-Olympic seats.

Thanks to Seb we are Greco-Roman wrestling in our minds of whether to disappear abroad during the Olympics as we are not feeling quite the ticket at the moment. 25-0. More holiday boxes than usual need to be ticked off. A pool? Proximity of fishing? Remote? Remote control for satellite TV? Enough already! Did I ever imagine that our sport mad sons would be so discouraged at the lack of availability of tickets that they would ever contemplate leaving this sceptered isle at such a time? As Strauss walks off caught prodding for 11, the fear, the uncertainty of the inevitability that I feel for the England batsmen mirrors the reasons for choosing to watch the Greatest Sporting event that has taken place on home soil since just before I was born, from foreign climes. 39-1.

It is the boxes, that is the corporate ones that are sticking like a fish bone in one's throat. I'm not referring to the Royal ones as they have always been there, and I don't intend to speak ill of the dead. Nor do I have the heart to speak of the nearly dead, save to say that I hope the NHS pull out the same stops for the rest of us as did the French equivalent for my son all those years ago, even though we needed his E Nelson.

Eight years ago we watched the Athens Olympics on TV in Peniscola in Spain. Barry Davies was the commentator. We spent an enjoyable hour or so trying to work out which country, excluding Greece would be last to enter the stadium. You needed a maths degree to be sure of winning as the names on the team plaques looked like quadratic equations.I didn't win. I could never differentiate properly. If you want more detail you need to download 'French and Spanish Cricket for Beginners' from Amazon.co.uk as it's lunch at the cricket and I need to take a cup of tea up to the missus. IIL-I at Lunch. At least I'm only contemplating Beefy eat his Samosas and not Toffee nosed Champagne swilling Charlies devouring canapés in Beef Wellingtons with chips on my shoulder. Oh by the way E111s are known as Napoleons in France.

To those sadly not able to get in to watch Ebbsfleet for £7 or to warm your hands with fuel bought from the Winter Fuel Allowance or to travel to Dartford Market on the FastTrack etc.

Went to London Prepares Gymnastics last night at the O2 with Ben's Mum and Dad and Lizzie of course plus Heth. Sat next to two Brazilian ladies. 2-2 as far as Gold medals were concerned. 2-0 to them as far as pints of lager were concerned. I am concerned as they said it cost them £5.40 a pint. If it wasn't for the fact that the wonderful Lizzie had brought Pizza half price in Tescos (Sorry about your shares, Tesco, not) together with a bottle of wine from Uncle Martin specially chosen by Nephew Jack who works at Majestic that we were able to consume in Car Park 1 due to the unseasonal warm weather that our generation has bestowed upon you, I would have been somewhat disappointed, to use an expression that our generation has failed to bestow upon you along with the appreciation of the apostrophe. The event was enjoyable and cheap especially for those of my generation.

The point of all this is twofold. Firstly to remind you that on Tues 17th Jan tickets for the Diving 'London Prepares' become available to be held at the Aquatic Centre from 20th-26th Feb. Once again they are reasonably priced and hopefully as with the Gymnastics you can actually get hold of them. Secondly to remind Seb Coe that just like thousands of others I have still not been able to get hold of any F***ing Olympic Tickets, cementing my view mirroring what most of my generation felt at the time of your athletic peak, that they prefer Steve Ovett as an individual to you. No hard feelings. Yet! And it's not just because you defeated my mate to become MP for Falmouth/Camborne.

Turkeys aren't just for Christmas

Happy Christmas to all except the annonny mouses. Hence the cat who will devour you next time the E-mail of your comment comes through.Ughhh! Christmas visitors included a lost dog, though unlike the three wise men who have got to the side table in the entrance hall 'Mollie' hadn't come far. Using technology not available to the Royals the owners were immediately informed of their loss. Mollie made herself at home. The only exchange of growls with our resident dog occurred when the newcomer lapped from the water bowl. I may advise the three travellers to bypass this area. Perhaps the drinks cupboard would provide a welcome detour. The owner turned out to be a visitor of a lady who lives up the road. He had the demeanor of King Herod with the word 'thanks' only just forcing itself out from his tight lips. Mollie obviously felt similarly as the missus had to carry her out. Her reluctance was heart warming, reminding me that this was the season of good will to men and as such The words 'Miserable bastard' may have been inappropriate and open to misinterpretation.

While in the vicinity of such influential dignitaries I would like to apologise for cheating during the Christmas Dinner game by looking at the label stuck on my forehead that I was supposed to decipher on the basis of Yes/No answers to my questions. The designer of the game had gone to great trouble to associate the labelled character with a skill, interest or aspiration of the person who's thought processes were ongoing only millimetres away. For instance my son with an interest in Countryside Management 'was' Bear Grylls', the husband of the game designer, an artist, 'was' Van Goch, and my wife was Bagpuss. The latter may seem obtuse, but we have a signed painting of the cat by Peter Firmin on a wall and the game designer lady played with his children when a child herself in Canterbury. (I hope I have not dropped any Clangers in the spelling of any of the names I have dropped)

My character had a beard like 'Cut Throat Jake' and was a wonderful exponent of the skills of the game which gives rise to this blog. For the benefit of the six wise ears only I owned up immediately to my act of deception. In fact confirming Mollie's instincts towards me I also removed the label put on the game designer's forehead written out for her by one of her daughters and exchanged it for another written out by the second daughter which was less derogatory of her facial features.
Do remember You A nonny mouses The point of this particular blog page is to warn you that unlike Bagpuss who left the mice alone, the kitten in the photograph will do to you what we all did to spam in the fifties.

French and Spanish Cricket for Beginners

Time to start writing again. For now I'll plug my E-Book 'French and Spanish Cricket for Beginners' downloadable from Amazon.co.uk. If you are one of those A nonny mouses who don't give their names, I'm not going to buy your Ug (sic) boots until you buy my book. For others 'French and Spanish Cricket for Beginners' has been reviewed 'As being a quite charming if entirely bonkers tale of one man's travels through Europe whilst trying to listen to the cricket'. Before the Goose gets past the point of no return, don't vote for a turkey and download yourself a Happy Christmas

Time to share my toboggan

No response from The Cricket Web yet. Cat got their tongue? I certainly don’t have their ear, but it’s not Felix that has got the ashes, it’s us. Maybe Andrew is continuing to sip their glut of Chardonnay that they can’t rely on us drinking for them any more. At the Lord’s Ashes Test Match they were giving away the stuff at Lunch time which is most unusual as you don’t get many freebies at HQ, discounting newspapers aside. 117-3. Ntini is not the bowler. He’s been retired apparently. Political commentary seemed notable by its absence though I could have missed them if indeed there were any as I’d flicked between TMS and TV. They did eventually say that not having had a Lordship bestowed upon him, Ntini’s only option was to get signed up for Middlesex to play at Lord’s. A missed trick for the powers that be. I think they are allowed to give Honours to overseas people, or is that only if they pay? Tony should know. With South Africa dithering the Queen could have got One to have got one over them. What a Brian Johnston Champagne moment it would have been. Having not honoured one of your own heroes with inclusion in the team one has to act to mark the status of the man. Not that I keep a grudge as you Web wise Aussies know but here’s another blow for your sparkling wine industry. I’ve made an offer that middle order champagne producers will not be able to refuse. What I said was: - Bonjour. Just a suggestion from the author of 'French and Spanish Cricket'. Talk to somebody high up in English Cricket (Not me). There is such a thing as 'The Brian Johnston Champagne Moment', dedicated to the late cricket commentator extraordinaire. What a wonderful gesture it would be for Franco-British relations, not to mention your profits for you to name one of your champagnes 'Brian Johnston' . Best wishes et a bientot.

            Meanwhile the South African batsmen without Snicko and Hot Spot continue to enjoy their benefit match. The Ntini affair was obviously playing on Smith’s mind as he rushed into open the South African innings. Swanny decided to give him a break in the slips as Collingwood was redislocated elsewhere in the field. I hear that England tried to overcome the lack of cutting edge technology by taking advantage of Obama’s friendly overtures to Putin. In Cardiff the Ruskies had used the diplomatic bag carried by the Aussie’s sledging coach as a drop. While Pontin was remonstrating with the England physiotherapist Monty removed the microfilm of Onishchenko’s circuit diagrams that he’d put to effect in the 1976 Olympics from the bag. Offensive fencing outside the off stump wasn’t an offence in those days. According to the secret papers released in the Thirty Seconds rule they tried to wire up the pre-oiled South African bats to resinate if the ball passed within two to three centimetres, thus triggering Snicko and causing a pulse of thermal energy of high enough intensity to conning the heat seeking sensors of Hot Spot into thinking they’d detected a hit. It turns out that the microfilm the Russians passed on contained a clip of the Press sisters breaking in to the Male athlete’s changing rooms so they could go for a piss without being noticed, thus proving the Australian sledging coach had been in contact with the Russians for a good few years and who’d been the one to nick England’s bowling plans. Using a souvenir Dennis Lillee aluminium bat as an aerial their scam only failed as Ntini who had gone into the dressing room the day before the Test Match to pick up his things noticed that his bat was the only one that had not been placed in the newly installed thermo controlled bat stand. It is believed that he was despatched before he could blow the whistle because of the danger of affecting Russian-South African relations, but it was really because he was miffed at not having his bat plugged in to the bat stand even though it had been set up before he had been dropped.

            Coming to England’s rescue was Michael Atherton, already implicated as being the Russian agent’s handler in the absence of Thierry Henry whose alibi was that he was otherwise engaged talking to Tiger Woods’ PR people about the possibility of reviving the Gillette Cup. 131-5. Swanny despite the drop is going for a hat-trick of man of the matches. Michae ‘Penguin’Atherton’s revival of the plan is given clear water credence because of his love of old war films. The idea of dust-in-the-pocketgate came from The Great Escape in which the POWs released the tunnel waste via their trouser pockets to their turn ups. Or was that just for the book? He suggested to the England team to watch The Longest Day. To differentiate between friend and foe the allies were issued with a clicker and so long as you had not landed in a swamp full of surviving croaking frogs you could shoot the respondent if they sounded off. Who’s got the clicker? Not Straussy that’s for sure. What’s that on Collingwood’s finger? No need for hands in pockets. Who’s wearing knee pads? 13 off Swann’s over.  50 to Kallis. We’re not clicking are we?

 We are now. As I return to the radio which I inadvertently turned off while watching Alex Ferguson check that there was at least five minutes added time I hear the name Steyn. 233-6. Is he night watchman for Morkel? Bye Sir Alex, as the ITV lot said you wouldn’t be happy if you had fifteen minutes of non scoring added time. Last ITV interview is it? Hello inscrutable Kallis on 87: he’s the difference. We’d be watching England bat by now if it wasn’t for him. Botham tells us that it is century number 33 in Tests. Eight overs to go; should be perfect for the West Ham – Arsenal game. Then the darts. A sort of Ashes. The Brett Lee look-alike with ponytail and beard against Phil the Power. Goughie was there last night. Let’s hope if the BBC get the Ashes back there won’t be uninspiring coverage as with their darts. Does PD James like cricket? Onions offers them the light by bowling a bouncer. No tears are shed. Tomorrow is another day.

      Today certainly is. That’shallot Kallis. Onions obviously was letting the umpire know that he needed his bed, and would have more of a spring in his step in the morning to run rings around the Batsmen. Three wickets in next to no time, though it was Anderson who really had them taped. Back to reality as Straussy is walzed out without moving his feet outside the off stump, though his new Partner, Trott soon breaks into a canter taking it to 30-1, though strictly speaking Cook is keeping in step. Radio 4 Long Wave listeners missed Trott playing on and Pietersen going for a duck. Radio 4 listeners with Sky TV listened to Headteacher David the Power Gower admonishing the three recently departed batsmen dismissing them to contemplate their schoolboy error dismissals. In similar vein Radio 4 Long wave listeners turned to page 42 in their missals to pray for the souls of the recently departed. I watch Collingwood on Sky crack one through the covers 5 seconds after Geoffrey Boycott oohed and aahed about it on radio 4 Long Wave. Yes it needs saying. I did teach for 35 years to earn the right to enjoy the cricket. So you Radio Five Live ranters slag off somebody else, preferably yourselves, lest ye forget we are still in the season to be jolly with my three wise men Gower, Athers and Hussain just past the lounge door en route to the stable to the right of the widescreen TV, as you look at the cricket. If you are wondering, Botham’s just returning from Cana where he’s drunk the place dry, a situation as with the dismal three from which they did not learn.

            The pundits have got their way. They’ve all wanted Bell to come in at 73-4 to prove his worth, well here he comes. Atherton says the same thing, as it’s only de Kock on the radio. I return to the telly from the garden where as a hunter gatherer I cut and chopped wood for the stove. I’d continued to listen to the cricket but I got the urge to watch the action despite the soothing sounds of the robin providing free to air background in harmony with Geoffrey from their respective territories. Prior has survived the initial deluge, Bell has taken a couple in the balls. All for the Cause. Bell nea…. That’s as close as he got to his 50. A Kallis long hop keeps the jury out. I hope we are not 73-4 again in the second innings just to deliver a swift verdict.

            Duminy comes on. Sky shows members of the jury how Duminy got Prior out last time. There was another Brett Lee - Andrew Flintoff Sporting moment of the year last night. It did involve a Brett Lee look-alike, but not a Freddie double. The double was a bull preceded by two treble twenties. That’s a 170 check out. Unlike so many other sports the achievement was immediately acknowledged for its uniqueness by the opponent. The opponent this time was the bearded Binger applauded by the commentators for reciprocating Freddie’s actions in an equal if opposite way. Will it get the same media attention? I doubt it. Taylor had become World Champion with another high checkout for the 15^th time and I didn’t see his name in the Honour’s list, nor did he make the BBC Sports Personality of The Year Award. In fairness he’s no Zara Phillips but then again Georgie Best was no Princess Anne.  It will go down in the annals of history as seen by  on TV by Sid Waddell. You’ve heard of sledging he said, referring to the original Binger and the boys not occasional on field sayings. This, he said, was more like a sharing a Toboggan. I would go further to suggest that for an Aussie to engage in such behaviour must be as unusual as a Jamaican Bob Sleigh team successfully negotiating the Canadian equivalent of the 10 banked bends of the Cresta Run. 226-7. Steyn again. 65 behind. New Ball approaching. Taken. Later than Botham imagined. Prior gets his 50. We trail by the same amount.

            And what do we learn this morning  boys about your batting technique? Well I’d say it doesn’t end after you’ve made the shot. Clearly first and foremost be aware. ‘Where’s your foot? Don’t be stumped or run out on a reaction bit of fielding ‘Is there a run?’ Don’t get run out and look to your calling and bear in mind you’ve got a partner down the other end who may run you out or get run out. Nothing new there Coach. ‘But what we add to the list of reminders from batting this morning is don’t walk away showing your disgust at an appeal, as the umpire will reward your apparent honesty with a finger. Furthermore when you are plumb out, shaking your head just makes you look a twat in Botham’s eyes. Lunch time. I look out the window. Time to share my toboggan. “Most of us would say that to hurtle voluntarily through 10 banked bends at a speed of up to 60mph, while lying head-first on a heavy steel toboggan with your nose three inches off the ice, is tantamount to complete insanity.”  Okay, point taken. Back to practising slagging off the Aussies.