Back in the technological dark ages, when journalists relied, in the main, on dictating copy down a phone line to the audio typist at the other end, known as a copy-taker, plenty of things could, and did, go wrong. As ever I found this out the hard way.
Cricket was especially tricky, because reporters working for an agency, in this particular instance PA, the Press Association, also had to dictate the scoreboard at the fall of every wicket, giving the new team total, the total overs bowled at that stage, each batsmen’s innings total, including the incoming batsmen — "not out nought" — the total of extras, the fall of the wicket and the over it fell in. Agency reporters also had to provide an accurate lunchtime scoreboard, a teatime scoreboard, the close of play board and completed innings with bowling figures and a breakdown of the extras.
The phrase that every reporter who had this tedious job dreaded hearing from the copy-taker was: "Don’t add up." Meaning that the batsmen’s runs and extras didn’t add up to the team’s total of runs. It was a fairly frequent snag and it entailed the reporter having to double, then treble check his own notes, compare them with those of his colleagues, and finally if still nothing balanced, disturbing the often irascible scorers, who worked under in tense pressure throughout and could not afford to miss the action.
Surrey were playing Yorkshire at Guildford. It was mid-July 1991, and I was supplying agency with match details and regular reports throughout the day.
Guildford being an out-ground meant we were sharing a tent with the scorers, and the scoreboard was being run by amateurs, schoolboys in the main.
On the stroke of lunch I dictated the score which I read from the main scoreboard that was closely monitored, or supposed to be, by the scorers, and dictated the following to the copy-taker: "Lunch scoreboard, Yorkshire first innings 107 for one, Moxon 74 not out, Byas 27 not out, extras six."
I then filed my lunchtime report, before setting off to a nearby marquee to buy myself some grub.
The Yorkshire reporters were great to work with lots of fun and loads of experience. They had seen pretty well everything that could happen in a cricket match. They were wise beyond their years. So perhaps, when one of them pointed out some 35 minutes later that the Yorkshire scorer had spotted an error on the main board I groaned.
"What should it be?" I asked.
"Moxon’s on 73, total should therefore read 106 for one. And it would probably be best if you were to ring copy now and make the correction."
"Oh, hell. I’m not going to do that. It’ll cause all sorts of trouble. They won’t know if I don’t tell them. All Moxon has to do is score a single and everything will be correct again without me having made a nuisance of myself, and so late into the lunch interval."
The reporter shuddered: "Ooh I swear I just heard the rattle of stumps first ball after lunch. You have been warned."
Keith Medlycott got things under way with his left arm spin and, first ball back, Moxon was out caught by Rehan Alikhan. The Yorkshire reporters fell off their folding chairs in hysterics. They were helpless with laughter.
The worst case scenario had happened. The sage Yorkshire reporter was clearly gifted with the ‘sight’, while I looked and indeed was, looking like a halfwit for having ignored his advice.
I then had a nightmare ten minutes explaining to the copy-taker why the total had just fallen by one run, but the wickets fallen had risen by one, and how Moxon had also lost a run in losing his wicket; perhaps this was a new law in the game, was the copy-taker’s sarcastic observation. I spent much of the rest of the afternoon apologising every time I went on to copy, I had different copy-takers each time and they all took the Mickey out of me mercilessly.
Memory added on July 3, 2021
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