Send In The Clowns

 As the stables are cleared at Yorkshire County Cricket Club, presumably in a desperate attempt to regain favour with the English Cricket Board and, thereby, avoid bankruptcy, I note that Darren Gough has been appointed the “interim” Managing Director of Cricket.  I have never met Darren Gough although I have admired him playing cricket and putting on a creditable show to win the third series of Strictly Come Dancing.  According to Sky, he is currently enjoying a “lucrative broadcasting career.”  The closest I came to him was at New Road, the home  Worcester County Cricket Club, in June 1992 during a match between Worcestershire and Yorkshire (which Worcestershire won comfortably).  In those days, Worcestershire Members, of which I was one at the time, could sit to the side of the Members Pavilion under the visiting players dressing room balcony.  During a lull in play on the day in question, Darren Gough held forth in an extraordinary monologue from the balcony  - impressing his opinions on anyone within earshot who cared to note his pearls of wisdom.  Amongst other things, Yorkshire’s Managing Director of Cricket designate was particularly forthright about the inadequacies of the Yorkshire Committee in general and the Chairman in particular.  It is to be hoped that his new relationship with Lord Patel, the Yorkshire Chairman, will be less problematic otherwise the employment designation of “interim” may prove a hostage to fortune.