Brian Close on England
Brian Close made his debut for England a couple of years after I was born, so he’s seen a lot of cricket. He doesn’t rate the current England team as the greatest, but then he wouldn’t would he? They don’t contain enough Yorkshiremen for his liking I suspect.
I’ll give him this though. He played the bravest innngs I ever saw. Wikipedia describes the innings at Lords in 1963 to try to beat the West Indies like this.
Close was recalled to the England Test squad in 1963, and played his first full series of five matches, against the West Indies. His innings in the second Test at Lord’s remains his best known. When England were pressing for a last-day victory, Close took the battle to the fastest West Indian fast bowlers, Wes Hall and Charlie Griffith, daring to advance down the wicket to them. This was before body protection and helmets were in use, and time and again the ball struck Close firmly on his body. But he persevered. With no other England player but Ken Barrington scoring above 20, Close’s innings of 70 saved the game for England, and came near to winning it. Set 234 to win, England ended on 228 for 9, with Colin Cowdrey famously coming in to bat (for two balls at the non-striker’s end) with his broken arm in plaster.
Close had been dismissed going for runs to win the game, and his courage earned him many plaudits. His shirtless torso, black and blue with bruises where he had been hit, made the front pages of the newspapers the next day.
There has never been another innings like it. I don’t think that there has been any other batsmen, who would have attempted to do what he did.
Getting To And From The Race
Getting to the cycle race in London today was easy. I just took a 38 bus, got off at Cambridge Circus and then walked through to The Mall.
Not at any time, was I told that the bus was being diverted, although once I got off, I realised this was the case as it didn’t go down Shaftesbury Avenue, but meandered around Trafalgar Square and on to Victoria via Whitehall.
It was coming back that I had the problem, as no-one had any clue where I could pick up a northbound 38 towards the romantic, Clapton Pond. There was one diversion sign for the drivers, but none indicating where the stops were. To make matters worse, entry to Charing Cross station seemed impossible.
In the end I decided to go to Tottenham Court Road and get a Central Line train to Bank. I did find a 29 bus that took me part of the way and dropped me north of the station.
I thought that at Bank, I could get a bus home, but the stop was closed, with the helpful sign, that it would close from the 2nd August until further notice.
A Helpful sign on a Bus Stop
It just said go to the next stop on the route. I was lucky in that a bus arrived and the driver let me on unofficially. But what if you’d been a lost tourist told to take a bus from the stop.
Transport for London must get their signage right when they divert buses. Not everyone knows the bus network, as well as I do!
Is This A Coincidence?
Something called X-Factor starts next week. Is this why so many televisions were nicked last week?
London’s Secret Cycle Race
Today, they have held the London Surrey Cycle Classic. I went down and had a look round.
You’d have thought that it was more run for the benefit of the Great and Good, as the publicity wasn’t very extensive and it was only by chance I heard it was on. I think it was on a traffic report on BBC Radio 5 Live. And I don’t drive! I didn’t see any detailed maps in the papers and although Transport for London has a route map, times of the race were all very sketchy.
I went to The Mall and there were quite a few people there, but little information. There wasn’t even anybody selling a souvenir program!
One thing I did pick up was a lot of discontent from cycling enthusiasts. All were complaining that they didn’t get tickets for the events in the velodrome for the Olympics and the serious ones felt that the Box Hill route was wrong, as no spectators would be allowed as it’s a Site of Special Scientific Interest. The original plan was to go up to Hampstead. After all they are the London Olympics not the Surrey Olympics.
Perhaps there are two races or classes in London; the Great and Good and the Hoi-Polloi. Obviously the latter can’t be allowed to spoil the party of the former. I suspect that most of those planning the cycling for the Games live in Surrey, that haunt of Manchester United supporters.
No wonder we had some little local rioting last week!
By the way the Great and Good think that this event is so special for them, that it is not being reported on television or radio. Or at least it’s not on my cable system!
The Police Don’t Like It!
Surprise! Surprise!
The police don’t like the fact that David Cameron is calling in Bill Bratton.
I’ve met a few high ranking policemen and with one glorious exception, they were not a bunch I warmed to.
They generally want to do things their way and just be given the funding to make their own successes and failures.
I once heard a comment from someone who was selling technology to a particular Police Force. The Chief Constable said that he wanted the best system that money could buy, but he didn’t want the company to sell it to any other Force.
Surely, with Police technology and equipment, it should all be standardised, so that each force uses the same equipment, vehicles and computers for the same jobs. Some have said that the dreadful Soham murders happened because two Police Force computer systems were incompatible and couldn’t talk to each other.
Imagine what would happen if the computer systems at Barclays couldn’t talk to those at Lloyds and HSBC.
Chief Constables are always harping on about their links to the local communities and that every Force has different needs. If you believe some of the stories in the reputable Press, some of them have been behaving in the manner of rather poor dictators, led much more by the rules of the Data Protection Act and the Health and Safety Executive.
They must accept that they don’t have a monopoly of knowledge on policing in the UK.
The Anonymous Widower 