Is Cricket Belgium's Summer Game?

Years ago when Aggers came up with the classic wind up that Hertz van Rentyl was a threatening quickie in the Dutch team England were about to face in some pointless one day game this was about the funniest cricket story ever to involve the low countries.

Now it transpires that the pleghmish (spelling?) may have invented cricket. Flemish weavers, not the besmocked English peasants of my Ladybird Book of Cricket, were thrashing rocks about with Shepherd's crooks it seems and because some obscure old English word which sounds like "cricket" sounds more likely to have been from Northern Belgium "crekettes" or some such we all have to roll over and accept that Hertz and his pals made the game up. The same guys reckon those craaaazy Belgians also came up with golf. Well they would, wouldn't they. And how brilliant they all are at cricket and golf now.

The research comes from a German and an Australian. Wickman can hardly think of two nations who would be most keen to strip the English of a bit of heritage so he'll be taking this report with a large pinch of nacl. And get this - part of the evidence they cite is "I was brought up with Flemish children and I know the language well. I immediately thought of the Flemish phrase 'met de krik ketsen' which means to 'chase a ball with a curved stick'." That's not cricket. That's HOCKEY. Maybe they made that up as well! At least the Dutch are pretty good at it. Or they were a while ago.

It's not April Fools Day so Wickman is going to take some deep breaths and relax and remind himself that even if, as John Skelton says in his match report of the time which the research quotes that the Flemish weavers (who were in England at the time) were "kings of crekettes" it would hardly be the last time that a touring team had come to our shores and smoked us at our national game. It might have been the first time, but not the last...