SPECTATOR SPORT
Lord's and ladies
Simon Barnes
I HAVE seen the future, and it looks well, at first sight it knocked the present and the past into a cocked hat. She was black and comely, standing a shade under six foot, wearing a pink suit and a welcom- ing smile that was for me alone, and she was standing in the Long Room at Lord's Not the normal place to see a person like her, or me for that matter. She was organis- ing a fundraising do for the Ram'n'Val, that is to say, Sonny Ramadhin and Alfred Valentine, spin-bowlers who bowled West Indies to their first win over England in Eng- land in 1950. Lord's allowed the fund to be launched from its sanctum sanctorum: click of high heels on the sacred floor. It was, therefore, a fine and symbolic occasion all round. Nineteen fifty brought the moment when the Long Room first noticed that there had been changes afoot in the world order over the previous century or so. The world was changing, the Empire was changing, the social order of England 'was changing and, inevitably, cricket was changing with it.
This week, it has all changed again. The Marylebone Cricket Club has come to terms with millions of years of evolution and agreed, like confused bird-watchers, that despite the pronounced sexual dimor- phism this apparently quite disparate pair — men and women, that is — are in fact members of the same species, and can now be members of the same club.
The club has, in short, voted to admit women members. The necessary two-thirds majority was at last achieved, white smoke appeared from the chimney, joy-bells rang out across the land, and a woman can now sit in the Long Room on match days, have a drink and say things like, 'I'd bat myself. There'll not be much lateral movement once the dew's burned off, even for Dazzler.'
In a sense, this is a piffling story. A pri- vate members' club has grudgingly decided to acknowledge, now that the 20th century is on its last knockings, that the 20th centu- ry has begun. Admittedly, the MCC owns Lord's, not a bad little asset, but it has no real part to play in modern cricket. Its role is symbolic and historical, but these can be quite important, can they not? When I hear the word 'image' I reach for my revolver. I abhor ill-thought-out notions about such-and-such an event 'damaging the image of the game'. It is damage to the substance of the game that we should con- cern ourselves with. These days, the MCC has very small importance so far as the sub- stance of the game is concerned, but it has a great deal to do with the image. In fact, one of the greatest errors in the modernisa- tion of English cricket has been to keep the offices of the Test and Country Cricket Board, now the England and Wales Cricket Board, at Lord's.
It meant that people referred to these organisations as 'Lord's' a word which evokes instant visions of crusty old buffers having P.G. Wodehouse conversations and wondering when Mafeking will be relieved. The vote removes an embarrassment from the game.
Still, plenty more where that came from. And there is one continuing mystery to me: why would women want to join a club like the MCC? Groucho Marx said the only wise thing about clubs, and that holds good for all clubs, including the Groucho.
Previous page
