A Close call for Etherley duo

"What do you do next time you play Evenwood?" we ask.

"Consult Brian Close beforehand," says Lee.

As Tuesday's column reported, Lee and batting partner Chris Renshaw walked off the field rather than face further legitimate hostility from Evenwood's West Indian professional Deighton Butler and all-rounder Johnny Maughan.

Brian Close stood his ground.

The Close call to which Lee particularly refers came during the third Test against the West Indies in 1976.

"Our fellows got a bit carried away," admitted captain Clive Lloyd afterwards.

Having totalled just 71 in their first innings, Michael Holding 5-17, England needed 552 to win when 45-year-old Close walked to the wicket with John Edrich, a bairn of 39.

Sixteen overs were possible on the evening of Saturday July 12.

Holding bowled seven without conceding a run but was then taken off after umpire Bill Alley warned against persistent short pitching. England finished the day on 21-0, to which Close had contributed a single.

His vividly-bruised body showed where the ball had principally made contact, Close encounters of the thud kind.

"I don't want to criticise the umpires, but we were unhappy with the number of short pitched balls," said England captain Tony Greig.

"There were two overs when four consecutive bumpers were bowled.

"Bumpers are part and parcel of the game, but this form of bowling makes run-scoring so hard."

Close was finally bowled for 20, scored in 162 minutes; Edrich, no less valiant, added 24 - the highest by an English batsman in either innings. England lost by 425 runs.

"It was disquieting cricket," concluded Wisden.

"The bowling was frequently too wild and too hostile to be acceptable."

For their courage in the face of adversity, neither Close nor Edrich was picked for his country again.

July 12 1976? "Millionaire superstar" John Miller won the Open at Royal Birkdale by six strokes, Malcolm Macdonald was on his way from Newcastle United to Arsenal, Morpeth Harrier Jim Alder claimed that 99 per cent of all amateur runners had taken payment, Seaham-born Peter Willey hit 133 in 150 minutes for Northamptonshire and 14-year-old Philip Jones took 6-7 for South Hetton II against Eppleton CW.

John Armstrong, self-styled Silly Old Sod, was playing for Witton-le-Wear in the Darlington and District League on the afternoon of the Etherley affair.

They were at Rockliffe Park in Hurworth, the Tees bank village where in 1968 Brian Close had opened a housing estate and noticed that there was a Bryan Close.

"My typewriter spells like that, too," he said.

John's 58, an estate agent and surveyor in Bishop Auckland. Rockliffe, he reckons, have the fastest bowlers in the league.

"I was batting at number eight, wearing every bit of protective clothing designed for cricketers and some that wasn't. In one over I got hit on some part of the body by every ball.

"I must admit that the thought of 'What the hell is an old man with arthritis and poor vision doing here?' did occur to me, but I'd rather have had my head knocked off than walk off the pitch."

Finally, however, he managed to put bat on ball - and was promptly caught for a duck.

Pondering the extreme pace problem, Durham County League chairman Peter Metcalfe had in Tuesday's column recalled Leadgate's Guyanan professional Dennis Hewitt - "Lads would rather go shopping with their wives than face him on a Saturday afternoon."

Leadgate wicketkeeper Michael Storey probably wished he'd gone shopping the day a Hewitt delivery broke his finger, but also remembers a match - "against Shildon, I think" - in which the opener couldn't put bat on ball. "The poor lad wasn't even lucky enough to get himself out," says Michael, from Rowlands Gill.

Finally the batsman decided that moving the sight screen might help, an instruction duly relayed from skipper to long leg.

"The batsman wants the sight screen moving," yelled the captain. "He certainly does," replied Brian McNally in the deep, "preferably to right in front of him."

Seeking further tales from the tea room, we looked on Wednesday afternoon into the Durham II v Nottinghamshire II match at Feethams, Darlington.

Nothing happened, save for the lightning propagation of rumours that the grass on the adjoining football pitch was at least a foot long.

Like Pinocchio's nose (shall we say) the fable has grown and grown. We conducted a swift ground inspection: an inch, as it were, covers it.

The sound of a likely story also comes from Crook, where umpire Michael Manuel's concentration was interrupted by a booming rendition of Mary Had a Little Lamb. The umpire gazed round the ground but was unable to find the culprit. Finally it was discovered that Crook Town FC, a quarter of a mile away, was testing its new public address system. Clearly it works.

Still bouncing along with the West Indian quickies, Tuesday's column sought the identity of the former Evenwood professional who played subsequently for the West Indies, is now in the county championship and once hit Etherley skipper Danny Hinge six times in an over.

Among those who knew it was Nixon McLean, now with Somerset, was Lee Gowland.

"Danny faced the final three balls from behind the wicket keeper, thus deciding to play 'Treacle' with Nixon," he insists. Treacle is not a game with which the column is familiar, though it may have something to do with sticky wickets. Others may know the rules.

And finally...

Today back to D B Close, the youngest cricketer to represent England - 18 years and 149 days - and also an England youth soccer international. He only made six Football League appearances, however. Readers are invited to name the club.

Syrup of figment, the column returns on Tuesday.

Sun takes toll but Jim returns bronzed

Unwearied by age but wilting in the 90 degree heat, Jim Caddy is back from the world veterans' athletics championships in Puerto Rico with a bronze in the Over 75s' 10,000m.

Chasing 79 next month, he blew around in under 56 minutes and was sixth in the 1500m and 5,000m.

"It's all about discipline," says Jim, who trains seven days a week.

"You can't not be bothered one day, because it's then too easy not to be bothered the next."

He's the former ICI man who lives in sheltered accommodation at the Sir William Turner Almshouses in Kirkleatham, Redcar, who took up running at 46, has two dozen pairs of training shoes and a treadmill in his cottage.

We wrote of him on July 4, as a result of which he was contacted by another Jim Caddy ("a distant relation," I think) in Spennymoor. They met up yesterday.

Redcar to Puerto Rico took 26 hours - National Express to Heathrow, flight to New York, another southward - journey's end sweltering in intense humidity.

"It was so hot that they had to start the marathon at 4.30am, but by the time they finished it was still boiling," says Jim.

"I'd trained harder than I ever have, but the last five laps really took it out of me. They should never have had the competition there, it could have been quite dangerous."

Barely out of breath, he'd just got back from his daily eight-mile pipe opener. "The day I get back home and can't do what I want to be doing will be the day I pack in running.

"If someone had asked me 20 years what I'd be doing in 2003, I'd have said I'd probably be dead. Instead I've competed in seven national and international athletics meetings since April. Every day is a bonus."

Alms and the old man , this one could run and run.

Patch, Ron Hails's four-legged friend for the past 17 years, has died. As familiar to Backtrack readers as he was on Park Drive cricket ground in Hartlepool, the old wagtail hadn't been himself of late but still kept Ronnie right. They'll miss one another no end.

Licensed larceny, we've spent two years pinching with permission from Colin Randall's admirable "Celebrity Supporters" series in the Sunderland southern fans' branch magazine.

Interviewees have included Sir Tim Rice, Kate Adie, Steve Cram, marathon runner Khalid Khannouchi and George Reynolds, who reiterated that until he was 21 he couldn't read or write.

"Backward, mentally deficient and illiterate was what they called me. They hadn't invented dyslexia."

The last in the series reveals those who got away, either because the link was too tenuous or that they wouldn't talk about it - among them Olga Korbutt and Niall Quinn's wife, said in a commercial for "the Irish equivalent to Persil" to be "wife, mother and Sunderland supporter."

Peter O'Toole declined, too, though his father - known as Captain Pat - had worked in the Wearside shipyards before becoming an itinerant bookie and may have been talked by the police into leaving town.

The family moved to Leeds. When Sunderland moved from Roker Park, said O'Toole, the romance finally died.

The Darlington and District 5s and 3s League presentations took place last night and may warrant further mention in Tuesday's column. It should in the meantime be noted that on Monday the brainless Britannia B, champions of the D division, played Britannia A - runners up in the same division - for the supreme championship of the pub. As always is the case, B came before A in the Britannia.

A Sunderland XI travels down the A19 to Easington Colliery next Tuesday (7.30pm) for a match against the Albany Northern League side in aid of the Luke Johnson Fund.

Luke is a 12-year-old autistic who has recently begun the Growing Minds programme which will involve specialist training, evaluation and assessment in America. Initially his family needs to raise £10,000.

Easington Colliery FC chairman Alan Barkas will also accept cheques made payable to the Luke Johnson Fund. He's at 2 Dilks Street, Bishop Auckland, Co Durham DL14 9AP.

Published: 25/07/2003