Quote Originally Posted by Burney View Post
Yes. There was always that dreadful thing of looking at the opposition and seeing the usual array of teenagers and middle-aged fat blokes and there, sticking out like a bulldog's böllocks in deepest Surrey stockbroker country would be some strapping young black geezer. And the opposition captain would give you a grin when you were going out to toss up and say something like 'Young Denzil's joined us this year. Played a pretty high standard, I believe. Lovely lad'. This 'lovely lad' would then spend the first few overs of the game trying to rearrange your face.

It was quite fun when you had the ringer, though. One season we had two. That made skippering so easy.
Yes - I remember playing Burnham and they had a lad from Barbados playing for them. He was a bit rapid. At one point I was umpiring (having cunningly batted and been out while he was taking a breather) and he was even scary then. Our batsman manage to dig out a yorker, run and single and said to me "That was close." "Damned right," I replied. "To be honest if he appealed I would have just given you out not to anger him"