Bishop of Durham bowled over by Test match call-up

"It's a great thrill. I'm thinking of other ways I can make the most of it," he says, mysteriously.

The 66-year-old bishop, who claims to appoint clergy on the basis of whether they can bat or bowl, is booked for Saturday, August 24 at Headingley - the ground where he saw his first Test match.

"My father took me when I was eight or nine, against the Australians. Don Bradman was playing, that's how far back I go."

The "other ways" in which he hopes to make the most of 30 minutes with Henry Blofeld are likely to include promoting cricket in Lesotho - formerly Basutoland - the mountainous southern African kingdom with which the Diocese of Durham is officially linked.

On a recent visit, Bishop Michael arranged to meet the African director of the International Cricket Conference to discuss ideas for developing the sport in an under-developed country of two million people. Within a few years, he hopes to arrange for a Lesotho schools team to tour England.

"I'm keen to help ensure that cricket is developed over there as a game," he says. "It's in its infancy but we have some sponsorship for equipment, including bats, balls and plastic pitches which you can just roll out.

"It will take time to get things in place, but I am quite hopeful. Cricket is very important."

We were talking on Sunday morning at the back of St Mary Magdalene's church in Belmont, Durham, where Bishop Michael had helped lead the parish's 150th anniversary celebrations - more, of course, in Saturday's At Your Service column.

Though neither had heard the latest developments from India, the bishop is more hopeful for English cricket.

"I think we are taking a turn for the better. Leadership is so important and we have a first-class captain in Hussain - who learned his cricket in Durham, of course.

"He and Duncan Fletcher have given the side confidence, discipline and a faith in their own ability."

A member of both MCC and Durham County, he tries to watch two or three days cricket each year at both Lord's and Chester-le-Street, is delighted at Durham's elevation to Test status, but has still been unable to inspire a revival in the Durham diocesan clergy cricket team, with which the Backtrack column has some unfrocked affiliation.

"We have some quite good individual players but they just don't seem to gel," says Bishop Michael, who so far has not been persuaded to lead that particular diocesan activity from the front.

In 1998, however, he did play in a fund- raising match for the Children's Society, at Bishop Auckland. "They put me on the boundary, which was quite right, but the thought did occur to me that I could die with all that unaccustomed exercise.

"Had I done so, of course, I would certainly have died very happy."

AT a bit of a Lewes end as usual, last Friday's column remarked upon the curious custom in Lewes - whither Tow Law travel on Saturday - of burning an effigy of the Pope every November 5.

Both John Winn in Little Ouseburn, near York, and Tom Purvis in Sunderland suggest that this may not be as inflammatory as first appears, since in 1557 Pope Paul IV ordered that 17 Protestants be martyred at the stake on a hill above the Sussex county town.

In a spirit of fairness, if not necessarily of ecumenism, they now burn Guy Fawkes an' all.

The Newcastle United publicity machine, meanwhile, is arranging a photo opportunity of Bobby Robson handing over the keys of the team coach to Lawyers supremo Dr Graeme Forster (PhD, metallurgy.)

The Doc, however, insists that he won't be doing a Brian Clough (Hartlepools United, circa 1966) and taking the wheel himself. "I'm driven enough already," he enigmatically adds.

BACK from a trip to London, John Briggs in Darlington mischievously reports an announcement on the Underground: "The west-bound Piccadilly line is closed due to an incident at Arsenal." What's the betting, adds John, that Arsene Wenger didn't see it?

STILL kicking about the capital, Wear Down South - the magazine of Sunderland's southern supporters' club branch - carries an interview with Robert Kane, Sunderland-born lead singer with Dr Feelgood.

Kane recalls a gig at Newcastle Opera House on December 7, 2000. "Robert has something he'd like to show you," announced the compere as the band left the stage. The cheering intensified until Kane bounded back on stage - wearing his Sunderland shirt.

"In an instant he went completely from hero to villain," reports Colin Randall, Shildon lad made good.

It was just three weeks after Sunderland's now fabled 2-1 win, and Shearer's missed penalty, at St James' Park. The booing rose to a crescendo.

"I only did it for a laugh, thinking it would be taken in that spirit," says Kane. "How wrong I was. I just took a bow and fled."

Easington Colliery are the Arsenal of the Albany Northern League - five defeats at home, unbeaten away. Though the journey to London by GNER takes only slightly longer than that to Easington by number 213 bus, we plodged off anyway to the Durham coast on Saturday. Like the glorious Gunners, they were less than happy with yet another draw.

Discussing the sort of days when you throw your kit bag in the corner and vow never again to whet whistle, former Football League referee Terry Farley recalled in Friday's column his all-time stinker.

It was Bishop Auckland v Tow Law, late 1960s. Paul Dobson, still in Bishop, finds it equally impossible to forget.

"It was one of Alan Shoulder's earliest games for Bishop and I remember him being rugby tackled.

"I was only a bit bairn, but I thought at the time that the referee must be mad to put up with that kind of stuff."

At the end, as we mentioned, a little lad ran on the field with a pair of glasses for poor Terry's greater clarification. "He was in the year above me at Etherley Lane juniors," says Paul.

Austin Elliott, Hartlepool United's finance director during Garry Gibson's chairmanship, is still involved in the game. He's laundryman and spare defender at South Shields White Horse, in the Over 40s League.

Thus baggaged, Austin duly collected the washing on Saturday, discovering on arrival at the ground that he'd picked up the wrong strip.

White Horse ran in the wrong colours, anyway, lost 8-0 - "they were passing to the other side," says league secretary Kip Watson - after which Austin took the mucky gear back, paid, left it behind and was finally reunited with their own stuff.

"It would never have happened at Hartlepool United," says Kip, though Garry may know differently.

THE first club to win all four divisions of the "old" Football League (Backtrack, February 1) was Burnley.

Brian Shaw in Shildon (again) today invites readers to suggest how Rotherham United made FA Cup history in 1991. We're on the spot again on Friday

Published: Tuesday, February 5, 2002