Mike Harfield - Not Dark Yet: A very funny book about a very serious game

It was the 1st May 1976. Colin, Roger and I were trying to decide what to do with the rest of our lives and, more particularly, what to do at the weekends. Sitting in a pub drinking Fullers ESB, waiting for the FA Cup Final to start, is a great way to do this.

In those days, most pubs didnt have TVs so it was back to someones flat with a couple of cans to see the match. The thing about Fullers ESB is that if you have too many pints (i.e. more than three) you can barely remember what you discussed, what the score was or sometimes even who was playing. (Southampton 1 Manchester United 0, Bobby Stokes in the 83rd minute).

The next day we checked the papers to see if Southampton really had beaten Manchester United and then we returned to our earlier discussions. We had tried to analyse exactly what we did do at weekends and had struggled to come up with any meaningful answers. Looking back now, drinking all day and watching a football match on TV in the middle of the afternoon was a bit of a clue but probably too obvious then. We were in our mid 20s - before wives, children, mortgages, dodgy knees and bad backs. We all loved cricket but perversely had not played since school. There seemed no reason not to start playing again and so the idea of the Clifton Hampden match was conceived.

The plan was to get a team of friends together and play the Oxfordshire village where my parents lived. Clifton Hampden had a league side on Saturdays and played a few games on Sunday, including one against a Lord Gnomes XI, a team from Private Eye. Clifton Hampden was, and still is, a small village on the Thames, had a lovely cricket ground and two pubs. One was the Barley Mow which first opened 650 years ago and gets a mention in Jerome K. Jeromes novel Three Men in a Boat. The other was the Plough, situated conveniently close to the cricket ground. What could be better? Contact was made and the club said that they would be delighted to entertain us.

As I like organising things and, more importantly, nobody else wanted to do it, I was designated captain. What could be difficult about getting eleven people together to play a friendly game of cricket? We were at the beginning of what was to become the hottest summer since records began. A weekend in Oxfordshire was on offer. Once I started asking around, and the word spread, my biggest problem would probably be choosing the best eleven players.

I managed to sign up Alan, a hockey player, Nick a squash player, Rob a rugby player and Steve who was a footballer. You may notice a bit of a theme here. None of them actually played cricket. Never mind, at least they were keen to play and reasonably fit. I also recruited Hugh who I knew had played cricket because I had seen him do it at school. I had high hopes too for Ken who I worked with. He was a bit older than the rest of us; in fact he was really old - about 35. His unique attraction to me was that in his late teens, he had opened the innings for Blackpool in the Northern League with Rohan Kanhai. He had been a schoolboy hero of mine (Kanhai not Ken) and Ken had regaled me with many stories of Kanhais prodigious batting and drinking skills. My thinking was that anyone who had batted with such a legend must be at least a half-decent player.

Unfortunately, Ken had given up cricket and taken up golf. I tried to goad him with what Colin Ingelby-Mackenzie, the Hampshire captain, had said. Golf is a game to be played between cricket and death but to no avail. I also asked him for Kanhais telephone number but that wasnt forthcoming either. Ken isnt dead yet and is still playing golf but he never did make it to any of the Clifton Hampden matches.

Time was marching on and I was beginning to get an inkling of the particular difficulties involved with trying to raise a cricket team. A week to go and, including Colin and Roger, I only had eight players. People I approached broadly fell into three categories:

1. They liked the idea of the river, the pubs and chatting with old friends in the sunshine but did not want to have a hard ball thrown or hit at them.
2. They really, really wanted to play but unfortunately had to visit their aunt/mark some homework/wash their hair.
3. They would like to play but would have to let me know later.

Over the years, I would become very familiar with all three categories. I had no problem with the first; it was going to be a social occasion and the more spectators the better. No problem with the second category either unless they happened to be a decent player in which case I was seriously upset. It was the third category that presented the main problem back in 1976 and continues to this day.

If hes more Johann Strauss than Andrew Strauss then there is no real difficulty; I just say I will get back to him. But if hes a good player, how long do you wait for him to commit and at what point do you say to the really keen guy who cant bat, bowl or field but has an attractive sister/wife/daughter and you know will definitely turn up - youre in?

Captaining a cricket team is the hardest job in sport. If the team is doing well and wins easily, anyone could have done it. If the team is doing badly and loses, it is almost certainly the captains fault. Everyone who plays cricket, and quite a few who dont, can point out what a captain is doing wrong and how he or she would have done it differently i.e. better. Infamy! Infamy! Theyve all got it in for me. Kenneth Williams could well have been talking about the trials and tribulations of being a cricket captain.

Before you even get on to the pitch you have to get eleven players to agree to play. Then you have to hope and pray that they actually turn up. Some years later, Clive (an unreliable regular by then) assured me on the Thursday before a match that he would be at the pub on Sunday, well in time for the game. On Sunday morning he rang me. The conversation went something like this:

Clive: Hi Mike, its Clive.

Me, with a slow feeling of dread: Hi Clive.

Clive: Whats the weather like?

Me: Fine, the suns shining.

Clive: Its raining here.

Me: Its not raining here.

Clive: So is the game on?

Me, with a greater feeling of dread: Yes, definitely.

Clive: Its really pouring here.

Me, beginning to accept the inevitable: Its great here, the sun is shining.

Clive: What time do we start?

Me: 2.30, just like the last fifteen years.