‘Organised loafing’ – that's what William Temple, the Archbishop of Canterbury from 1942 to 1944, called cricket. But surely that's the essence of all games. Young men and women run around for the pleasure of those who can't or won't. For the professionals, it's work; for the rest of us, it's fun.
It should also be diverting to read about, so long as writers maintain a sense of proportion.
Hugh McIlvanney called sport ‘a glorious distraction’. And Hughie knew whereof he wrote – until the second bottle
