The NYSD regular pens his Diary Fro mDown Under for The Northern Echo

IT WAS good to get back into club action last weekend, although it was rather strange that not a single one of my Aussie teammates mentioned the Ashes.

But there again as I brought them up on 47 occasions throughout the day perhaps they felt there was nothing left to say.

Another win, with three balls to spare, kept us top of the league and gives us a great chance of making the Grand Finals in March, but before then the English contingent will be looking to organise our annual match for the ‘mini-Ashes’ as they are known.

For the last four years a one-off game between an English League XI and an Australian League XI has been played here in Melbourne, and we have a 3- 1 lead.

It’s been great to play in the matches, particularly the 2007 meeting, which we won under floodlights. The games attract quite a bit of publicity in the city, being advertised in the usual understated Aussie style as ‘Tonk A Pom Day’.

Robbie Williams’ ‘Angels’ was the anthem used by the England team in the dressing rooms after their three Test triumphs.

This follows a longstanding Aussie tradition of having a victory song. They use ‘Under the Southern Cross’ but they’ll probably have forgotten the words by now!

The tradition extends right down through club cricket here, with most league sides having their own individually written numbers which are rolled out in the clubhouse after each and every win, although they are not always listened to with good grace by the opposition.

I WAS pleased to see James Pattinson, younger brother of Darren, getting a game for the Prime Minister’s X1 against England in Canberra.

I met both last year when Darren spent quite a bit of time at my former club, Buckley Ridges, where our overseas pro was his Nottinghamshire teammate Paul Franks.

Franks played every game as if it were his last.

And the pair of them were great company. We enjoyed some memorable nights out in the city.

WITH England back in Melbourne this weekend for the start of the one-dayers it’ll be interesting to see if Shane Warne will organise another Lamborghini for Kevin Pietersen… But at least KP can console himself with the fact he isn’t the first English cricketer to pick up a speeding ticket over here, that honour falling to Darlington player Doug Mulholland a couple of years ago.

Doug was playing club cricket here and rounded up a few other English lads for a trip to Sydney to enjoy the New Year’s Eve celebrations.

He managed to borrow a club vehicle for the trip – a 1969 Holden rally car with a surfboard strapped to its roof and replete with its original stickers, which appeared to be the only thing holding it together.

He set off with his four passengers, but a couple of hours out, with the road stretching for miles ahead and not a thing in sight, a police car ‘leapt out of a shrub’ and hauled them over to serve an on the spot fine of $250 for breaching the 100kph speed limit... a miracle in itself given the state of the car.

Later the car’s lights failed due to the floormounted dip switch being kicked from its moorings by the driver as he tried to lower the main beam. In the outback, in pitch darkness, and hardly another vehicle on the road, there was no option but to bed down until day break.

One of the lads, Great Ayton’s Steve Pennock, said there was no way he was going to sleep in a car with four other blokes, and decided he would kip down on the surfboard on the roof – a display of bravado that lasted all of a minute until a kangaroo bounded across the bonnet.

In 35 degree heat, with dingos howling, windows tightly shut, and air vents firmly closed, the five crosslegged he-men huddled together for safety, toilet breaks delayed until sunrise because no-one was brave enough to expose their nether regions in the dark for fear of being bitten, stung or eaten by the multitude of imagined predators that lay in wait.

The pungent Poms eventually arrived in Sydney 20 hours late after various other problems en route, with the ‘adventure’ quickly becoming an established part of the folklore of club cricket in Melbourne.

The T20 at Adelaide was pretty special, and not just because of the last ball finish. Players went round the ground with buckets collecting donations and it warmed the heart to see this gesture in support of the Queensland flood appeal.