In the dock

Ted McDonald, one half of the famous Australian fast bowling team (the other was Jack Gregory) that knocked England into submission in the first-ever 5-0 sweep, in 1920-21, was 45 when he was killed in a car accident. His car collided with one coming from the opposite direction. Miraculously neither driver was hurt although the cars were badly damaged. While the drivers, now joined by the local constable, were discussing the accident, another car approached, hit McDonald and killed him.

This much is known by most students of the game. What isn't common knowledge is what happened later. The driver of the third car, a typewriter dealer named George Foster, was charged with manslaughter. The court decided, however, that "no prima facie case of manslaughter had been made out", and Foster was acquitted. In the 1975 Ashes series Lord's saw its first streaker when a young man wearing only shoes and socks jumped over both sets of stumps. I am not sure if this was the incident that caused commentator John Arlott to say that old ladies in the crowd were getting a glimpse of something they possibly hadn't seen in years.

The streaker, a 24-year-old cook named Michael Angelow (no relation to the artist, I presume) had done it for a £20 bet. The following day he was fined £20 in court.

The details of these and other cases, from the petty to those involving murder, financial shenanigans, and Kerry Packer, are described in Caught in Court, cases involving cricket and cricketers. Written by John Scott, solicitor and cricket lover, who described his main activities upon retiring as "digging up my family tree, browsing in secondhand bookshops, and compiling bigger scores on the golf course than I made on the cricket field", it is a quirky history of the game as told through some 150 court cases.

There is the story of Learie Constantine being refused the room he had paid for, by the Imperial Hotel. This was in London where he was playing a match. The manager said, "We won't have niggers in this hotel." The matter was raised in the House of Commons, but by then Constantine had sued. He had also claimed 7 for 37 in the match, all clean bowled. Constantine was awarded nominal charges of five guineas, but the point had been made. In 1961 Constantine, one of the great allrounders, was appointed High Commissioner for Trinidad and Tobago in London, and two years later knighted. There is no record of any similar posting being enjoyed by the hotel manager.

Caught in Court captures both the drama of men like Constantine and Arthur Coningham, as well as the big issues of apartheid, Packer, Ian Botham, and Geoff Boycott (well, they were big issues for Botham and Boycott), and the many libel cases brought against newspapers. But Coningham first.

A chemist by profession, he played only one Test for Australia, where he became the first bowler to claim a wicket with his first ball in Test cricket. Since the batsman was Archie MacLaren (whose 424 remains the highest first-class score by an Englishman), Coningham was guaranteed immortality of sorts. His personal life doubly ensured that - after he sued his wife for divorce for committing adultery with a Roman Catholic priest.

Among those who felt they had been libelled in newspapers are Peter May, Ray Illingworth, Alan Knott, Max Walker, Clive Lloyd, and Graham Gooch. These cases were either settled out of court or made the players substantially richer. As far back as in 1963, The Cricketer wrote that the whole character of cricket had been "put in jeopardy by the tone of much modern writing, and in taking the action he did, Peter May has done the game a most signal service".

Four decades later I am not sure if the reporting has become less libellous but there are no cricketers suing, not even Sourav Ganguly and Greg Chappell, who have been the favourite whipping boys of the media. Cricket continues to keep lawyers busy, however, but now it is mostly officials who are involved. "Out of court" is that little room where things are worked out.