Lives in Cricket No 14 - Jack Bond

We managed to bowl them out and at tea our openers were still there. On resumption Jack and I walked round the boundary and eventually I said to him, “Well, Jack, what did you tell them?” “Oh,” he said, “I thought you were doing that!” We both laughed and wondered how on earth, from where we were now, we could get instructions out to our two batsmen. Fortunately our openers needed no advice and we won the match.’ ‘A few days later we found ourselves travelling together as a staff team to take on a remote village in the middle of the island. We arrived first – there was no sign of a wicket despite the local parson telling us he had prepared it and, rather than playing, he would be umpiring. It was the only match I have played in when I have seen an umpire signal six leg byes – in fact the ball had parted the scorer’s hair in the shed which acted as the pavilion. When Jack went out to bat there was another first – a six hit off the gloves, with a triumphant Jack flexing his right arm muscle and expressing his delight. ‘Later that summer I found myself on a hat trick bowling very experimental leg breaks. I took my courage in both hands and threw up a third leg break and there was Jack flying through the air as he had done years before to win a Gillette final to give me the one and only hat trick of my career. “I could not drop that one,” he said.’ 118 ‘Nobody ever locked their doors’ King William’s College at Castletown, Isle of Man.