This caps it all

I trawl through E-bay every now and then. it's a great insomnia cure. Generally I am looking for something to do with the house genealogy, works of art which have been incorrectly attributed  or Twickenham RFC memorabilia. In the last few weeks I have had a couple of good results.

Firstly I picked up a little limited edition sketch book by Northern artist Harry Riley.  Riley was a contemporary of L S Lowry and they knew each other well. Where as Lowry was renowned for his matchstick me, Riley was, and still is, a unique golf scene painter and commentator. The book I brought tracked Jack Nicklaus through his final two rounds at the Open championship at St Andrews. The commentary charts Jack's  thinking as he decided that missing the cut at his final Open was the best thing to do as he could not face two more days of high drama and emotion, nor did he want to deflect from the actual winner and the reception he should get. Typical Jack Nicklaus to the end, every bit the gentleman.

That's two of Harold Rileys sketch books I now own.

Things then got a whole lot better when I noticed what looked like a Twickenham RFC honours cap from 1926 in the rugby memorabilia section. I did a bit of checking and found that indeed it was a genuine article. I contacted the lady to see if she would sell outside the auction, but she was keen to let it run. I contacted the club treasurer to see what price he would fund up to and then played a waiting game. I won it at about ten percent of the price it could have fetched and it is now in the clubhouse collection with its fellow cap's.

Two were awarded each year to first XV players who had an outstanding season, and that tradition still goes to this very day albeit the designs are slightly different. One such cap is the oldest relic the club has dated as 1897-98

The cap I obtained had the name Bishop inked in the label and a study of the team photograph for that year shows a gentleman of that name sitting in the front row. I love it when a plan comes together.

Field of Dreams

Blimey! what a weekend. The house was invaded by our youngest and his mates, seven in all I think, who came down to support 'Trotter' who was playing on the wing for Birkenhead Park in their EDF Intermediate Vase cup final at the RFU in Twickenham Stadium.

How jealous was I that he got to run out on the hallowed turf, but good luck to him. I have known 'Trotter' almost as long as Kieran, and Maxine the same, so it was only right and proper that we went along too. I am, after all, a fully paid up member of 'Park'. Trouble was it kicked off at 10:00, being the first of three finals.

Anyway, there must have been over 1000 people watching, maybe more, as Exeter, Northampton and Leicester supports drifted in during the second half, and as a final it was not half bad.....Park took the lead with a few penalties, then Chester (for it was a local derby) scored a fairly soft try, but Park battled back to be leading 14-18 and they dominated the second half without putting the game to bed. 'Trotter' was playing pretty steady, a few good breaks and some sound defence, when sadly he was thrown a slow looping pass by his centre. If it had gone to hand it was glory time for 'Trotter' , but the Chester winger had all his Christmases instead, intercepting and running seventy yards to touchdown under the posts. 21-18 win for them, then. Still 'Trotter' managed to score later so the weekend was not a total disaster!!

The Masters, the first of the four major golf tournaments, was being televised this weekend, and it brought to mind a contrast between most major sporting events and golf. 'Trotter' was one of the few who can tell their kids they have played at Twickenham Stadium, and trod the same sods as many legends of the game. The final was one of five which the RFU and EDF collaborate to try to get grass roots players playing there. Football has its Amateur Cup and FA Vase aimed at lower league players running out at Wembley, but your average (or below average) Sunday league player has very little chance of playing there. There are amateur races at Aintree and Ascot for jockeys or point-to-point riders but again they are limited.

With golf, however, anybody can effectively turn up, pay their green fee and tread the same turf, putt on the same greens and shower in the same facilities as Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, Bobby Jones, Seve Ballesteros or any of the other famous names associated with the sport. Indeed, while playing Valderama in Spain a few years ago, I was delighted at the 17th to chip over the brook and onto the green for three, two putting for a five. I was only too happy to point out that at the Ryder Cup a few weeks earlier, Tiger had failed with his chip and found the brook, only managing a bogey. So for one hole, and one hole only, I was better than Tiger!!

The irony of course ,is that Augusta, where the Masters is always held, is almost impossible to play as a visitor, but hey, there are enough other top courses around to more than make up for it.

Dessert anyone?

Two things inspired the subject of this particular entry, namely a chance to watch The Great Escape again, and the re-introduction of Kevin Keagan, to Newcastle United. Well what really caught my eye was 'King Kev returns to the Magpies' and I suddenly got all enthusiastic for nicknames.

Football nicknames, particularly for players, seem to be fairly mundane on the whole, King Kev is not very imaginative is it, and Quitter Man returns probably doesn't give the right image. Most players have 'ie' added to their name and become Kingie, Smithie and so on. In days gone by the nicknames seemed more imaginative, Ron Atkinson was called Mr Bojangles. He would probably of been called Bling these days though, and the great Alan Ball could easily have been Ballie, but was referred to as Bouncy!. The German captain Franz Beckebauer was fittingly referred to as the Kaiser.

Football club nicknames are more imaginative and traditional, hence the Magpies nickname reflecting the fact Newcastle play in black and white. Interestingly though, a magpie is a very deep purple, they just look black!

The Great Escape indicated how POWs all tended to have nicknames, the film featured The Tunneller, The Scrounger, and for Steve McQueen, the Cooler King, give the number of hours he stayed in there. Institutional nicknames come to the fore in many popular TV programmes. In Porridge, the nicknames were usually the persons surname, Fletch, Godper and so on, although the King of the Jungle, Christopher Biggins, was referred to as Lukewarm.

Londons Burning introduced us to the nickname culture which prevails in the fire service. Bayleaf, Sicknote, Zorba and Vaseline being some of the more regular characters.

Other walks of life have their own legendary nicknames. In politics, for example, David Lloyd George as the Welsh Wizard, and Margaret Thatcher as the Iron Lady tend to stick. Two famous golfers have turned their nicknames into world wide sporting brands as Greg Norman launched The Great White Shark, and Jack Nicklaus, the Golden Bear range of products.

I never had a clever nickname at school, where children can be particularly cruel with some of their choices. Apart from the obvious ones like carrot, for the red heads, our year seemed to specialise in Lord of the Rings nicknames, so we had a Bilbo, Barkis and Frodo in the late '60s well before the films gave them cult status.

One of the magical nicknames I have come across though is for my friend Martin Wooden. Martin was 1st XV captain at Twickenham and a seriously good prop, and he had the nickname 'Pud'. Now I always thought this related to his waist measurement, but no, you need to read The Good Ship Venus for the answer.

The trainee cook was Wooden
by Christ he was a good 'en
he t***d off twice in a bag of rice
and called it sago puddin'

They swim in the sea, we eat them for tea.......

Interesting weekend just past. Our oldest, Tim and his girlfriend Lili, used the house for an engagement party. Interesting guest list which included my present and past wife, and her two ex-husbands!!

Tim, as an only child, seems to have masses of siblings, and all were present for the big event. It all went off well, I think. I behaved myself and got to bed about 2am......not too bad.

They are planning to get married twice, bit like me really! The first will be in Brazil in February 2009, the second in England later in the same year. There seems to be huge interest in going to Sao Paulo so i think they will be surprised by the turnout. It will be Summer there so the combination of a wedding and holiday seems spot on to me.

Talking of holidays, I am just off to St Lucia, to defend my 'Sir Vivian Richards Pro-Am' title around the tricky but very picturesque St Lucia Golf Course. I won it last time with Jeff Crowe, the New Zealand cricketer, and two local members. Jeff is a cousin of Russell, and had just come back form seeing him get married. Jeff plays of 2 so we were quids in really compared with some of the team members. Ian Botham, Sir Gary Sobers, Tony Greig and Chris Cowdrey were playing, as well as the host, and it was a sound day out all round......I am told there is a fair bit of development going on at the moment around the course, and Jack Nicklaus is building a second 18 holes nearby. It will be interesting to see the new club house as well.

I am also playing in the 'Todgers Trophy' overseas edition when I return. This year it is in Portugal, and it is the annual tournament for Twickenham Rugby Club. In true rugger tradition, we have to go as famous Englishmen. That should irritate the Welsh amongst us.

They got knocked out of the Rugby World Cup on Saturday didn't they? To Fiji of all people. The QFstage is now quite interesting. I would take Argentina and South Africa to go through and meet in the semi, which then conjures up potentially four games in which anybody could win. On their day England can beat Aus, and France can turn over NZ. An E v F semi could go either way, as could the SA v Argie one. So we are suddenly looking at an Argie v England final! Who would have thought it a week or so ago?