An Evening with Johnners

by Brian Johnston

  He said, ‘He’d have been caught at cover!’

  He’s a great person, and one of the great characters.

  A bit of advice which I give to people – sometimes it will get you promotion and sometimes the sack – is, if you are going to do something which you think is the right thing to do, but you suspect your boss may not think so, I say, stick to your principles and do it.

  There’s a lovely cricket story, which is an old one now but it illustrates this perfectly, about the late Duke of Norfolk, who went as the manager of Ted Dexter’s team to Australia in 1962/63. A strange chap to have as a manager, a Duke, but they loved him in Australia – they called him ‘Dukey’ – because wherever MCC played he leased a racehorse and ran it in the local meeting.

  They told me this story, which I hope is true. MCC were playing against South Australia at Adelaide, and about twenty-two miles outside Adelaide there is a racecourse called Gawlor. There’s a lovely paddock there with eucalyptus trees and gum trees, very picturesque.

  The Duke had a horse running there, so he thought he would go and see it. He spotted it under the eucalyptus tree and walked across the paddock in his pinstriped suit, panama hat and MCC ribbon, very much the Duke. As he approached the horse, to his horror, he saw the trainer put his hand in his pocket and give the horse something to eat.

  He thought, Oh, my God, I’m a member of the Jockey Club at home, and he went up to the trainer and said, ‘I hope you didn’t give him anything you shouldn’t have, trainer. We don’t want any trouble with dope here.’

  ‘No, no, Your Grace,’ said the trainer. ‘I just gave him a lump of sugar. I’m going to eat one myself. Would you like one too, Your Grace?’

  The Duke thought he’d better humour him, so he ate the lump of sugar, talked about the race and went off to watch it from the grandstand. Five minutes before the race started, in came the jockeys, waddling as they do.

  The Duke’s jockey went up under the eucalyptus tree to his horse and the trainer said, ‘Look. This is a seven-furlong race. The first five furlongs, keep tucked in behind and don’t move. But for the last two furlongs, give him all you’ve got, and if anyone passes you after that, it’s either the Duke of Norfolk or myself!’

  But the story about doing what is right or what is wrong concerns one of those marvellous matches at Arundel, which the Duke used to run against local teams. He was running one against Sussex Martlets and they had an eleven o’clock start in those days. At a quarter to eleven they were an umpire short, so the Duke said, ‘All right. I’ll go down to the Castle and get my butler, Meadows.’

  So he got in his shooting brake with the Labrador lying in the back, drove down to the Castle and went through the green baize door into the pantry. There was Meadows the butler, polishing the coronets and the silver. The Duke said, ‘Meadows, take your apron off, put a white coat on and come and umpire.’

  So, reluctantly, Meadows did, although he didn’t know much about cricket. It was one of those days of gentle drizzle, not wet enough to stop, but making the ground very slippery and difficult. The Duke’s team were batting, one hundred and ten for eight, and the Duke came in at number ten and went to the non-striker’s end. The chap batting thought, I’d better let him have the bowling, so he pushed one to cover and said, ‘Come on, Your Grace, come one.’

  His Grace set off, but he slipped up and landed flat on his face in the middle of the pitch. Meanwhile cover point picked the ball up and threw it over the top of the stumps. The wicket-keeper whipped off the bails, turned to the square leg umpire and said, ‘How’s that?’

  The square leg umpire, inevitably, was Meadows the butler. What was he to do? He knew what he ought to do and there was his boss, who wouldn’t be too pleased, but he stuck to his principles.

  He drew himself up to his full height and said, ‘His Grace is not in!’

  Apropos of that, when I was in Australia with Peter May’s team, there was an umpire who wasn’t very good. His name was McInnes and on the previous tour with Len Hutton he’d been very good indeed, but somehow he had failed. He made one or two bad mistakes.

  Tom Crawford, who used to captain Kent second eleven and was a great friend of mine, was talking to Don Bradman about this.

  ‘The trouble with your umpires, Don,’ he said, ‘is that they’ve never actually played Test cricket or even Shield cricket. They’re not first-class cricketers. They’ve learnt all the laws and passed exams, but they don’t know what goes on in the middle. At home, all our umpires are either Test players or County players.’ (That was true then, but I think we’ve got some now who aren’t.)

  Don got very indignant about this. ‘No, no,’ he said. ‘What about McInnes? He played for South Australia until his eyesight went.’

  Then he realised what he’d said!

  Now I’m going to lunch at the Savoy on Wednesday with the Australian team, and I shall tell them the story which was told by the best after-dinner speaker I ever heard, the late Lord Justice Birkett. He told it in 1953 to Lindsay Hassett’s team and said how welcome they would be wherever they went in the British Isles.

  ‘But,’ he said, ‘one word of warning, we don’t wear our hearts on our sleeves in this country. We are a bit cool and reserved; we often don’t know the chap next door, even though he’s lived there for forty-five years. But don’t worry, on the surface we may not be friendly, but underneath it we are. Indeed, we treat each other exactly the same.’

  He then told the famous story of the Flying Scotsman leaving Kings Cross non-stop to Edinburgh. Four men were reading papers in the corner of a carriage. They glided through the Hertfordshire countryside and after thirty-two miles, got to Hitchin. One of them put down The Times that he was reading and said, ‘Look, we’ve got three hundred and eighty-four miles to go. Let’s talk and get to know each other and the journey will go so much more pleasantly. I’ll tell you about myself. I’m a Brigadier, I’m married and I’ve got one son who’s a banker.’

  The chap sitting opposite him put down his copy of The Times and said, ‘You won’t believe this. I’m also a Brigadier, I’m married and I’ve got a son who’s a schoolmaster.’

  The third chap said, ‘Well, this is the most amazing coincidence,’ and he put down his Times. ‘I’m a Brigadier, I’m married and I’ve got a son who’s a lawyer.’

  They all looked at the fourth chap, who was reading the Sun, and they said, ‘What about you?’

  He said, ‘I’d rather not,’ so they went on talking amongst themselves.

  They got to a little place called Sandy, about fifteen miles up the line, and they turned to this chap and said, ‘Come on, join in. We’re having so much more fun.’

  He said, ‘No, I don’t want to.’

  ‘Come on,’ they said, ‘be a sport.’

  ‘All right, have it your own way,’ he said. ‘I’m a Regimental Sergeant Major. I am not married. I’ve got three sons – and they are all three Brigadiers!’

  There are other things about cricket: we’re told there’s a lot of pressure these days, and people do get irritated, aggravated and frustrated, but I think it’s dreadful, because, as I say, it should be fun.

  A father I knew was trying to teach his boy the right way to play cricket and he said, ‘Never get irritated.’

  The boy said, ‘What’s irritation, Dad?’

  So the father said, ‘Well, I’ll teach you about irritation, aggravation and frustration.’ He got a telephone and dialled a number at random and a man’s voice said, ‘Hello?’

  ‘Is Alf there?’ said the father.

  ‘No,’ said the man, ‘Alf doesn’t live here,’ and bang he put the phone down.

  The father said, ‘That man’s a bit irritated, son.’

  ‘What about aggravation, Dad?’

  ‘All right,’ he said, and dialled the same number again.

  The man’s voice said, ‘Hello?’ and the father said, ‘Is Alf there?’

  ‘No, Alf isn’t here! Are you the same man who ran
g just now? If you don’t ring off, I shall get the police!’ Bang.

  ‘He’s very aggravated now, son,’ said the father.

  ‘Yeah, but what about frustration, Dad?’

  So the father dialled the same number. The man’s voice said, ‘Hello?’

  The father said, ‘It’s Alf here. Have there been any calls for me this morning?’

  The other thing is: don’t panic. There’s nothing more awful than seeing a cricket team panicking. I love Corporal Jones in Dad’s Army: ‘Don’t panic! Don’t panic!’ And there’s a perfect example of how not to panic.

  A chap woke up one morning, drew his curtains, looked out of the window and saw, to his horror, a gorilla in a tree in his garden. Well, he didn’t panic, because he went straight to the Yellow Pages, dialled a Gorilla Catcher and said, ‘I’ve got a gorilla in my tree.’

  ‘No problem, sir, I’ll be round in quarter of an hour.’

  A quarter of an hour later, a little yellow van arrived and out of the back of it the gorilla catcher took a ladder, a pair of handcuffs, a shotgun and a bull-terrier. So the chap said, ‘What are all these things for?’

  ‘Oh, it’s quite easy,’ said the gorilla catcher. ‘I put the ladder against the tree, I climb it and shake it. The gorilla will then fall to the ground. Now, at that point, I want you to release the bull-terrier, who is trained to bite human beings and gorillas in a very painful place.

  ‘The gorilla knows this and to save himself, will put his hands down over his private parts. You run forward, put the handcuffs on him, and you’ve got him.’

  ‘That’s all right,’ said the chap, ‘but what about the shotgun?’

  ‘Oh,’ said the gorilla catcher, ‘I forgot to tell you about the shotgun. Sometimes, when I climb the ladder and shake the tree, I fall down. In that case, get the shotgun and shoot the bull-terrier!’

  Now there’s one more story that my young ten-and-a-half-year-old grandson, Nicholas, told me. It’s extraordinary the stories they come back with from school!

  This was about three football fans, an Englishman, a Scotsman and an Irishman. They were stranded in the desert. I don’t know what they were doing in the desert, but they’d been there for a week. They were very hungry and they came across a dead camel, so they decided to cut it up and eat it.

  The Scotsman said, ‘I support Hearts. I’ll eat the heart.’

  The Englishman said, ‘Well, I support Liverpool. I’ll eat the liver.’

  The Irishman looked a bit glum. He said, ‘I support the Arsenal. I’m not feeling very hungry!’

  Just before we stop, I’ve said that cricket is fun. Now, I want you to cast your mind back to August 1991, the Friday of The Oval Test match against the West Indies. Bad light stopped play at half past six and Peter Baxter, our producer, turned to Jonathan Agnew and myself and said, ‘Go through the scorecard, will you please, to fill in time.’

  Gallantly, I started the scorecard. I got down as far as Ian Botham, who had been out ‘hit wicket’ and this is what followed:

  [Tape recording]

  Johnners: ‘Botham, in the end, out in the most extraordinary way.’

  Aggers: ‘Oh, it was ever so sad really. It was interesting, because we were talking and he had just started to loosen up. He had started to look, perhaps, for the big blows through the off side, for anything a little bit wide – and I remember saying, “It looks as if Ian Botham is just starting to play his old way.”

  ‘It was a bouncer and he tried to hook it. Why he tried to hook Ambrose, I’m not sure, because on this sort of pitch it’s a very difficult prospect. It smacked him on the helmet, I think – I’m not quite sure where it did actually hit him …’

  Johnners: ‘Shoulder, I think.’

  Aggers: ‘Shoulder, was it? As he tried to hook, he lost his balance, and he knew – this is the tragic thing about it – he knew exactly what was going to happen. He tried to step over the stumps and just flicked a bail with his right pad.’

  Johnners: ‘He more or less tried to do the splits over it and, unfortunately, the inner part of his thigh must have just removed the bail.’

  Aggers: ‘He just didn’t quite get his leg over!’

  Johnners: ‘Anyhow … [chuckles] … he did very well indeed, batting one hundred and thirty-one minutes and hit three fours … [Agnew buries his face in his hands and starts to giggle helplessly] … and then we had Lewis playing extremely well for forty-seven not out … Aggers, do stop it … [Bill Frindall laughs in background] … and he was joined by DeFreitas who was in for forty minutes, a useful little partnership there. They put on thirty-five in forty minutes and then he was caught by Dujon off Walsh … [snort from Frindall] … Lawrence, always entertaining, batted for thirty-five … [Johnners starts to wheeze] … thirty-five … [gasping] … minutes … hit a four over the wicket-keeper’s h … [high-pitched giggle] … Aggers, for goodness sake stop it … he hit a f … [dissolves into uncontrollable laughter] …’

  Peter Baxter hisses at Jonathan Agnew to say something.

  Aggers: ‘Yes, Lawrence … extremely well … [collapses completely] …’

  Both men are now speechless with laughter, tears rolling down their faces.

  Johnners: [hysterical] ‘… He hit … [his voice getting higher and higher] … he hit a four over the wicket-keeper’s head and he was out for nine … [crying and dabbing at his eyes with a large handkerchief] … and Tufnell came in and batted for twelve minutes, then he was caught by Haynes off Patterson for two … [calming down gradually] … and there were fifty-four extras and England were all out for four hundred and nineteen … I’ve stopped laughing now …’

  That was the most professional piece of broadcasting I ever did! You see, I kept going regardless. Peter Baxter said to Aggers, ‘Say something, Aggers! Say something!’ He was meant to join in, but he got as far as ‘Lawrence …’ and he burst out laughing too.

  But it does show that cricket is fun and the nice thing is, the BBC put it on Pick of the Week and they also put it out on television on the BBC Sports Personality of the Year programme. I’m often interviewed by people from abroad and they always mention it, so the giggle went round the world, and I don’t think it was a bad thing.

  Can I once again thank you very much for coming. I hope you have enjoyed meeting me, I have enjoyed meeting you. So I will finish on this little song, which goes like this:

  [Brian sings a few lines from ‘When I Discovered You’ by Irving Berlin]

  ‘… but the greatest discovery

  Was when you discovered me

  And I discovered you!’

  Thank you very much.

  THE END

  AND FINALLY…

  When the famous Ian Botham ‘Leg Over’ incident was originally broadcast, I was listening to Test Match Special on the radio at home. As soon as I heard Brian’s first stifled chuckle, somehow I knew he was going to get a fit of the giggles. By the time he finally stopped, I was crying with laughter myself and had tears running down my face. It was, and still is, the funniest thing I have ever heard.

  Thousands of others felt the same. Many drivers, listening in their cars on the way home from work, had to pull into the side of the road until they had calmed down. There were reports of a two-mile tail-back at the entrance to the Dartford Tunnel on the M25, because some drivers were laughing so much that they were unable to go through the toll-booths.

  A few days after the broadcast, the BBC’s Head of Litigation, Diana Adie, received the following letter from Tony Alexander, a solicitor with a firm called Heffrons in Milton Keynes. I have spoken to Mr Alexander and, happily, all involved are now fully recovered from their injuries:

  Dear Sir,

  Re: Cricket Commentary – Friday 9 August 1991

  We have been consulted by Mr Wally Painter and his wife Dolly. On Friday evening our clients were in the process of redecorating their hallway. Mr Painter was perched on a ladder in the stairwell of his house, whilst Mrs Painter held the ladder steady.
Our clients’ aquarium with assorted tropical fish was situated at the foot of the stairwell.

  Our clients are keen cricket enthusiasts, and were listening to the summary of the day’s play on Radio Three, when Mr Brian Johnston and Mr Jon Agnew were discussing Mr Ian Botham’s dismissal, which apparently involved some footwork which Mr Botham failed to consummate.

  The ensuing events caused a vibration in the ladder and, in spite of Mrs Painter’s firm grasp, Mr Painter fell off the ladder, landing awkwardly on the partial landing, thereby dislocating his left wrist. The ladder fell on Mrs Painter, who suffered a contusion to her forehead.

  The 5 litre drum of Dulux Sandalwood Emulsion fell and crashed through the aquarium, which flooded the hallway, depositing various frantically flapping exotic fish onto a Persian rug. The Painters’ pedigree Persian cat (Mr Painter spent many years in Tehran as an adviser to the late Shah) grabbed one of the fish, a Malayan red-spined Gurnot, and promptly choked to death.

  The water seeped down into the cellar where the electricity meters are located. There were several short circuits, which resulted in (a) the main switchboard being severely damaged and (b) the burglar alarm (which is connected to the local police station) being set off.

  Meanwhile, Mr and Mrs Painter were staggering towards the bathroom, apparently in paroxysms of hysterical laughter despite their injuries. Within minutes, the police arrived, and believing the Painters to be vandals and suspecting, as both were incoherent, that they had been taking drugs, promptly arrested them.