A Rare Warm Welcome for McGrath at Lords

It was good to catch up with an old mate of mine, a certain Glenn McGrath, the other day at Lords where he, together with 20-odd other famous fast bowlers from yesteryear, assembled for a one-off and magnificent gathering and also to carry out some fine work for the Lords Taverners with the Street Elite programme designed to encourage kids to adopt recreational activities in the cities.

McGrath was especially potent at the home of cricket, using its famous slope to devastating effect against a long list of hapless English batsmen as they helped him to a world record for a fast bowler of 563 test wicket.

"It's my second favourite ground in the world behind my home ground, Sydney," he told me. No wonder his name adorns the famous board in the pavilion denoting those who bagged five wickets in a test match here, a list incorporating a who's who of cricket but not, amazingly, Shane Warne, who compiled numerous four-for's, but never a five-wicket haul.

"In our last test here both Warney and I were on four wickets each with England nine down," McGrath recalled. "Warney had a long spell but just couldn't get that elusive fifth wicket. In the end I got the last man out and Warney missed out." I refer to McGrath as a mate because he was part of the Steve Waugh-led Australian cricket team that I joined for a week in Queensland for a chapter in my book, "Playgrounds of the Gods." He is as pleasant off the pitch as he is ruthless on it and spent a great deal of time helping me out during my time with the boys.

I subsequently spent a day with him in Adelaide before the doomed 2007 Ashes series in which Australia smashed Fred Flintoff's England 5-0. McGrath stood in the middle of the Adelaide Oval and declared: "Australia will win the series 5-0 and the series will be won here." I pointed out that Adelaide was just the second test but McGrath reiterated the point.

"In all intents and purposes it will be won here." It was the 2nd test, of course, where England famously snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Two-down, with three to go, there was nowhere back after such a numbing loss. Since then he has lost his first wife Jane to breast cancer, and now re-married. I spent a two-hour flight back to Sydney with Glenn in which he talked of his pride in Jane, and her constant battle to beat the illness. Jane's memory will live long, though, after the couple founded the McGrath Foundation, a charity that provides breast care nurses in the more rural areas of Australia. See www.mcgrathfoundation.com.au.

Today he seems more mellow, which is what retirement, the sense of satisfaction of a job very well done, and the traumas and consequent recovery of his personal life tend to do to you. Not many Englishman will say it is good to see Glenn McGrath at Lords, but it was, and I hope to catch up with him again very soon.

Legendary bowlers Glenn McGrath, Courtney Walsh, Curtly Ambrose, Devon Malcolm, Sir Richard Hadlee and Makhaya Ntini staged a special Street Elite coaching session with pupils from Archbishop Tenison’s School. As cricket’s number one charity, The Lord’s Taverners is dedicated to giving youngsters access to recreational opportunities and Street Elite, supported by the Berkeley Group, is just one of many programmes which are run throughout the country, designed to provide children with positive sporting and recreational outlets.