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Cricket’s dark arts, plus letters on regattas, salt and dinner

Letters recall cricket’s “dark arts,” a 1963 regatta scandal, rock salt labelled 10m years old, and competing definitions of dinner.

·2 min read
Silhouettes of cricket players against setting sun

Regarding your editorial on cricket fair play, as an elderly cricket fan, I can remember being told as a small boy to watch a Yorkshire wicketkeeper who was known, when standing up to the bowler, to nudge the stumps with his toe when the ball was close enough to make it look like

“bowled out”
. But in those days, league cricket was serious business and not played for fun. Tony Brown, Kingston, Ontario, Canada.

What happened at the 1963 regatta?

May I present the Seagull outboard race scandal of 1963? At a regatta in Coverack, I was hanging over the bow to keep it down when we were overtaken by a faster boat. With a boathook, I carefully pushed his fuel tap shut; he mysteriously stopped several yards short of the finish line.

Did we carry away the prize: 2/6d? My lips are sealed. Jonathan Fletcher, Helston, Cornwall.

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How old can rock salt be?

Re dating fossils precisely, I once bought a carton of rock salt whose label said the salt was 10m years old. It then advised that it should be used before the following August. Richard Barnard, Wivenhoe, Essex.

What is dinner?

When I started out as a social worker in 1969, a client told me that dinner was the meal that had potatoes. Ron Gould, Brighton, East Sussex.

Breakfast, brunch, elevenses, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner … I’ve given up and just graze all day. Dr Bob Aron, Ilkley, West Yorkshire.

Surely dinner is whenever the person who’s cooking it says it is. Pete Bibby, Sheffield.

This article was sourced from theguardian

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