Start the Car: The World According to Bumble

The World According to Bumble

Start the Car

David Lloyd

Dedication

To Diana, Tags, Susan, Phil, Steven, Ben, Spike, Graham, Sharon, Joseph, Joshua, Freddie, Sarah, Enty, Sam, James and Jasmine. Hope you enjoy it!

Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Introduction

Part 1 – In the Box

1 That Bloke off the Telly

2 The Sky Larks

3 Ranting, Raving and Reviewing

4 Life’s Tweet

5 It’s Not What You Say

Part 2 – In the Middle

6 Brushed up in Mönchengladbach

7 The Men in White Coats

8 Loose Lipped but Card Sharp

9 Twenty20 Kicks Ass

10 The Crown Jewels

11 Crowded Streets, Lonely Hearts, Alarm Clocks and Snakes

Part 3 – In the Blood

12 Get ’Em In!

13 Ian Rush? Who’s He? Exactly!

14 Hit for Six by a Pensioner

15 Hitting Sixties

16 Ooh, What a Ding-Dong Du

17 I’m Dreaming of a Hot Christmas

18 Suck-it-and-see Motoring

19 Every Slumdog Has Its Day

20 Birdies, Eagles and Mallards

21 The Million that Got Away

22 Hit the North

23 Bumble for Prime Minister

24 The Regiment

Photographic Insert

Acknowledgements

What next?

About the Authors

Copyright

About the Publisher

Introduction

Thanks for buying this book. The proceeds will go to a very good cause, namely the David Lloyd Retirement Fund, and, I assure you, will be redistributed to numerous outlets, in various personal pursuits across the globe. Oh, and rest easy in the knowledge that I will have fun doing so.

Of course, you might not have put your hand in your pocket to purchase this, so, for those of you who have received it as a gift on Father’s Day, on a birthday or at Christmas and want to pretend you have ploughed from cover to cover; for those of you who really like the thought of reading but never venture much further than the introduction; for those of you who normally do but find it to be the kind of book you just can’t pick up after putting down; for those of you who thought you were investing in the life story of some bloke involved in top-level tennis; for those of you wanting to know no more than the secrets of my successful leisure club empire (you’ll be sadly disappointed); for those of you whose concentration spans waver after a tweet or two; for those of you who have picked this up in the smallest room during a break between courses at a friend’s dinner party – here is the deal. Pretty much every essential detail you need to know about me is listed below. Welcome, however briefly, to my world.

My 50 Favourite Things

Career moment (playing): My 214 not out against India, Edgbaston, 1974

Career moment (broadcasting): Yuvraj Singh’s six sixes in an over off Stuart Broad, World Twenty20, 2007

Opponent: Joel Garner. He would bowl me out with a bath sponge

Team-mate: Graham Lloyd

Modern player: Can’t separate Virender Sehwag and Kevin Pietersen

Cricket ground: Sydney

Football team: Accrington Stanley

Footballer: Duncan Edwards

Holiday destination: St Ives, Cornwall

Tipple: A pint of Black Sheep or Timmy T’s

Meal: Chicken Madras with naan and lime pickle

Country: United Kingdom

Insect: Ladybirds are OK

Saying: ‘Don’t let the bastards grind you down’

Animal: Dog

Pastime: Fishing

Personal item: Motorbike

Boyhood hero: Ken Barrington

Book: Tragically, I Was an Only Twin – Peter Cook

Film: Brassed Off

Band: The Fall

Album: Imperial Wax Solvent – The Fall

Motorway: M6 toll road

River: Wye

Hotel: Lygon Arms, Chipping Campden

Mode of transport: Bike

Season: Spring

Beatles or Stones? Stones

Colour: Black

Decade: 1960s

Restaurant: J Sheekey, Covent Garden, London

Pub: The Hesketh Tavern, Cheadle Hulme

Advice received: ‘Be yourself’ – my dad

Advice given: ‘If you are a politician, don’t knock on my door’

Cake: Fruitcake

Flower: Rose

Number: 134

Condiment: Lancashire Sauce

Board game: Cluedo

Gadget: Chainsaw

Film star: Ray Winstone or Russell Crowe

TV soap: Emmerdale

Politician: Not one of them cheating, conniving, low-down dregs of the earth

Cricket tour: New Zealand

City: Manchester

Car: Audi

Memory: Loss of

Piece of trivia: Monaco’s army is smaller than its symphony orchestra

Comedian: Tommy Cooper

Joke: My granny started jogging in 1998 … we have no idea where she is now.

Chapter 1

THAT BLOKE OFF THE TELLY

Being on television inevitably means you get recognised by people when you are out and about. It is something you become accustomed to, and I have never really had a problem with it, although I did once get freaked out when a bloke came straight out with ‘You’re David Lloyd, aren’t you?’ Because when I say I am recognised, I genuinely am – only never as myself. I have had Rasputin (he had a massive beard, didn’t he?), Tony Blair and Alan Titchmarsh over the years. Nice to know I have made such a good impression.

To be fair, at least it is normally another famous face from the world of cricket that I get. Although with my specs on I also encountered one of the more bizarre shouts. An Australian bloke walked up to me in a pub in Manchester and did a double take. ‘Hey, I know you, you look like one of the Proclaimers,’ he said, his forehead crumpling in thought. ‘What do you mean, one of the Proclaimers?’ I protested. ‘I either look like both of them or none of them. They’re bloody identical twins! Or they were the last time I looked.’

It is not as though this identity crisis has hit me solely since I hooked up in the Sky commentary box, either. Now I come to think of it, it has followed me around since my playing days. When I signed for Cumberland in early 1985, I was asked to do a local radio interview over the telephone. We went through the usual rigmarole of how the move had come about, what offers had surfaced elsewhere, how I saw the side’s chances that summer and what role I would fulfil within it.

It was a pleasant enough chat, and the interviewer wound down with a final question: ‘Do you think you will adapt to the Cumbrian north-west weather again quickly after spending so much time in the Caribbean?’ The silly sod had got me mixed up with my brother Clive. I put him right, of course, and following a lengthy pause I heard his muffled voice relay the information to his producer: ‘Hey, they’ve only gone and signed the wrong one!’ I had some great times with Clive at Old Trafford, he has been a great pal, and he still lives down the road, but fancy getting a pasty bloke like him mixed up with a bronze Adonis like myself!

Nowhere are people more cricket daft than India, and appropriately it is there that I have experienced some of the daftest shouts. One chap in Rajkot was overjoyed when I agreed to pose with him for a picture at the airport. ‘You are my most good commentator Sky Sport,’ he told me, through clenched teeth, as we grimaced for the first snap. After seven more shots, I made my excuses and left. ‘Thank you, Mr Paul Arlott,’ he said. ‘For being my friend.’

Now they don’t get a great deal of international cricket in Rajkot, I grant you, so the locals tend to get excitable when a game comes to town. After England were trounced there in the winter of 2008–9, I was asked for more photos at the ground. I was only too happy to oblige until the chap pointing the camera said: ‘Excuse me, Mr Duncan Fletcher, look this way please.’ There must have been a particularly virulent strain of this eye infection going around, as later that evening came a knock at my hotel door. Three chaps were standing outside and greeted me with: ‘You are our favourite umpire, Mr Hair.’ And you can imagine the levels of my paranoia when even the hotel staff weighed in. Upon checking out next morning, the receptionist said to me: ‘Thank you for staying with us in Rajkot, Mr Bruce Yardley.’ I was glad to get out.

This was enough to put a chap permanently on edge. In Bangalore, one autograph hunter instructed me: ‘Please sign this, Tony Greig.’ So I did exactly that to get my own back. OK, Greigy was a former England captain, but he is six foot four and speaks with an unmistakable South African accent. I undoubtedly preferred the next error, as I left the ground in Chennai during a pre-Christmas Test match. ‘You are most famous English Mike Brearley,’ I was unequivocally told. I gave myself the once over, confirmed in my own mind I was not, but appreciated being thought of on the same intellectual level. If you are involved in mistaken identity it’s always better if it paints you in a decent light.

And you can also have some fun. Whenever we are in Leeds for a Test match, I make a dash for the Princess of Wales pub and sink a pint or three. A group of us were in there one year when a rather big Yorkshire lass, bedecked with tattoos from head to toe, sauntered up and barked: ‘You’re the commentator, aren’t you?’ She was quite an intimidating sight – supping a pint like a rugby front-rower between sentences – so I meekly replied, ‘Yes, I am.’

‘I just wanted to say I love you on Test Match Special, Jonathan,’ she continued. Jolly nice of her to say so, I thought, as I subtly brought up Agnew’s number on my phone, passed it on to her and suggested she give me a call any time she needed tickets.

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