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Holding Fever: when club side Rishton signed the fastest bowler in the world

Huge crowds turned out to watch Michael Holding play at Blackburn Road in 1981 – and to enjoy the club’s late barBy Scott Oliver from his book Sticky Dogs and Stardust 2To paraphrase Bishop Berkeley’s famous empiricist thought-experiment: if a legendary over is bowled in a game that isn’t televised, did it really happen? The answer is: yes, Bish, it happened. In fact, Geoffrey Boycott still remembers punching a 150kph throat ball toward Joel Garner in the gully. But, unless you happened to have been watching Tony Francis’ two-minute despatch on News at Ten on Saturday 14 March 1981, it would have slipped past your attention that Rishton’s new pro, Michael Holding, had relocated Geoffrey’s off stump 20 yards nearer the press box. Which, if you were one of the Lancashire League’s top-order batters, might not be a bad thing to have slipped your attention.Nevertheless, if they hadn’t seen the recent Barbados bombardment, they will have had vivid memories of Andy Roberts’ and especially ...


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