Sez Les

WELL, what a week it has bean - and, advisedly, I spell it wrongly.

Firstly Sean Bean gets hammered. By Neil Warnock.

Then there's the jelly bean affair in the Test match at Trent Bridge.

What all that was about I'm not sure. I mean, why jelly beans?

I don't know anybody who eats them. OK Ronald Reagan used to, but can you name me anybody else?

Apart from an England cricketer that is - and, clearly, they're not eating them.

What's more the offending beans looked like unsucked ones.

Personally, I can't understand why they don't have fruit gums instead.

Half-suck one of those, lob it down and you'd certainly have a sticky wicket to bowl on!

It might have been seen more as a schoolboy prank. But I reckon the headmaster would have been less pleased wih other matters.

He set a captain's example with the bat in the second innings but the response from too many others was simply not good enough.

The first series defeat since 2001 awaits - which, if there's a bit of gloom about, shows how well England have done at home in recent times.

Next week's last Test should be real humdinger but it'll take something for England's excellent home run not to become a has-been!The time's up for Houghton batter in unique dismissal

THEY went into the record books last year for winning a national competition at Lord's.

This week, Houghton Main Cricket Club might go into another kind of record book for being a victim of the most unusual and rarest form of dismissal in a game of cricket - a player timed out.

It happened, to general astonishment throughout the game when news filtered out, in last Saturday's top of the table clash with Darfield in the South Yorkshire League.

Inevitably, there's a story behind it.

Houghton had bowled out leaders Darfield for just 63 but one of Houghton's openers, miffed at an altercation with an opponent whilst fielding, decided to leave.

In the words of one Houghton player - "he'd had a barney, taken t'huff and decided he was off." So, the player left the ground.

It barely seemed to matter with such a small target to reach.

But then things went wrong and as the wickets tumbled, out went an urgent phone call to their miffed batsman - who had actually driven off to watch another game at Barnsley's Shaw Lane ground.

He dashed back to Houghton arriving just as the ninth wicket went down, 17 runs short of victory.

A frantic scramble to get ready and padded up ensued, knowing that he had just three minutes to be out there and ready to face the next delivery.

Out he finally went, adjusting pads etc, along the way but on arriving at the crease, he began to tie up his laces - which meant he had still to put on his batting gloves.

By now well over the three minute limit, Darfield's patience had run out and they appealed for 'timed out' (one of 10 methods a batsman can be out) and the umpire upheld the appeal.

So the final wicket had fallen and Houghton Main had lost.

No-one I've spoken to, many involved in cricket as player or official across decades, have ever come across a 'timed out' dismissal before.

And the name of the player who took so long... Chris Speed!