The Twelfth Man 2011

25 leave his company for three hours and we became friends. When I left a tour early because my Dad had died he was waiting for me at Heathrow. He invited me to his house at Alderney and said I could bring members of the Yorkshire team with me. Sadly none of them wanted to come with me except Ted Lister. He rounded his talk up by talking about his two greatest heroes. Brian Close and Freddie Trueman. “I took my son to a dinner where Brian was talking and told him that he was the hardest man in the room. Later on he said to me ‘I thought he was the hardest man in the room but I saw crying’ I said yes because he was listening to what Fred said about him.” October – Before the meeting with Howard Clayton started, Chairman James Greenfield paid a tribute to Society memember Keith Aaron who died at home after attending the previous meeting Howard, who was born in Middlesbrough, scores for the England U19s both at home and overseas. He has also been the press box scorer for Test matches at Headingley Carnegie. “I got interested in scoring at school because I couldn’t bat, bowl or field. I bought a scorebook and taught myself how to score. One day at school a teacher asked anybody would like to score at a school match on Saturday and I put my hand up.” After leaving school he moved to Leeds to go to university and has stayed there since then. After leaving university he became a teacher and carried on scoring for various teams in his spare time. “In 1990 I wrote to Tim Lamb asking him if they had a scorer for the England under 19’s tour to Australia. He wrote back and if you can get to Australia you can score. So I got to Australia and got a week’s scoring. In March 1990 Tim Lamb asked me if I wanted to do it on a regular basis. I said yes and I keep getting appointed. In 1993 I went to Sri Lanka with the U19s. Since then I’ve been on nine overseas tours as well as scoring in England during the summer, I wouldn’t miss it for the world. I am pleased as punch to be involved with the U19s.” Howard then described how he got involved in scoring for the press at Test matches. “Three years ago the ECB asked me if I would like to score the Test match at Headingley. In the press box I am totally alone. The press don’t speak to you unless they want some information.” He believes David Sales of Northamptonshire should have played for England. “At 16 he had everything. Chris Schofield of Yorkshire scored more runs at U19 for England than Michael Vaughan did. Mark Broadhurst took 34 wickets for England in only two years. Alastair Cook made it to the full England side from the U19s in the shortest time. When Asem Rafiq came back to the U19s”. Howard has a new winter job as the new Editor of the Second Eleven Annual handbook. “From the counties I receive information from the counties about their home matches and one-day competitions. Howard also told the Society that he does his scoring on but also keeps a paper copy. He also spoke about cricket fans favourite topic Duckworth Lewis. He said: “An Australian has written a programme which is more compatible to windows and does the calculations much quicker.” October – Freelance cricket writer Andrew Collomose received the Society’s J.M.Kilburn cricket writer of the year award and then told us about his book The Magnificent Seven . He said: “Never for a moment did I think I would win join the winners list. I first visited the Society in 1990. In 1989 I was made redundant by the Daily Express and in the following year I began freelancing for The Telegraph and in the same year I managed to get the League Cricket in the north column started. It was a great experience for me and I rememember once a hat trick of stumpings.” The column ran until 2008. For Andrew the title “The Magnificent Seven” had found memories for him. “After seeing the film twice in two days me and my friends set up a Magnificent Seven Society and even got Yuel Brinner to be the President. We saw the film in various cinemas throughout Yorkshire. So when I had an idea about a book about Yorkshire’s championship and cup wins from 1959 to 1970 the title was obvious. We decided to let Ray Illingworth do the forward and Brian Close to end it and to let a different player have one year. We had something for Geoffrey Boycott to do in the book but he declined to work with us.” Margaret Brayshaw presents Howard Clayton with a WCLS glass The Society’s JM Kilburn Cricket Writer of the Year 2010 Andrew Collomosse receives the award from Society committee member Colin Barker in late October 2010.