They were the last hurrahs for Eton v Harrow at Lord’s, loud enough that you could hear them from way down Wellington Road. From that distance it sounded rather like the place had been taken over by a couple of hundred schoolboys shouting out Ten German Bombers, which wasn’t quite right; the bombers in this particular version of the song were actually from Harrow. It was one of a series of chants, along with, a little later in the day, renditions of “No noise from the strawberry boys”, which was apparently aimed at the Etonians, and was met with a retort of “Twenty prime ministers”.
The two schools have been playing their annual match here since, well, before here was even here. The first game between them, in 1805, was held at the old Lord’s ground, down in Dorset Square. More than two centuries later, its time is just about up. MCC actually cancelled it last February but was forced to backtrack when a handful of members kicked up a stink over not being consulted first. So the club ran a survey to get a sense of the opinion among the membership. Among the 8,907 members who responded, 44% were in favour of keeping it and 43% were opposed.
So the club decided to kick the decision down the road. In 2027 it plans to survey the members again, in the hope that by then they’ve either recruited enough new ones, or lost enough old ones, to finally push the decision through. In the meantime, they’re going to start hosting the final of a national schools competition here too, which, given the state of English schools cricket at the minute, will at least open up opportunities for Millfield, Sedbergh, Whitgift and all the other well-resourced private schools who have been so cruelly denied the opportunity to play here every year.
Wherever those 4,000 or so members who voted to keep the match going were on this particular Friday, it wasn’t at Lord’s. There were perhaps a hundred or so in the pavilion, and maybe a hundred more in the boxes in the Tavern and Mound Stands. There had been a three-line whip to get the lot in the boxes to come along, because they pay good money for the privilege, and the profit MCC makes off the back of the match is, at this point, the last good reason for playing it here rather than at some other, smaller ground like Arundel or Wormsley.
Or at least it’s a stronger argument than the other one you often hear, which is that it would be an act of discrimination against the privileged to get rid of it. After the annual match is scrapped, Eton and Harrow will, of course, both be welcome to enter that national schools competition and take their chances at making it here on merit, along with everyone else. Till then they can enjoy the fact that they get to play here more often than England’s women’s team do.
The boys had the run of the place, and made good use of it. They always do. The match has always been an excuse for a jolly. Lord Byron played for Harrow in the very first one, made seven in the first innings and two in the other, scores which swelled to 11 and seven when he wrote to his brother about the match a couple of days later.
“Later to be sure we were most of us very drunk,” Byron continued, “and we went together to the Haymarket Theatre where we kicked up a row, as you may suppose when so many Harrovians and Etonians meet in one place. I was one of seven in a single Hackney, four Eton and three Harrow fellows, we all got into the same box, the consequence was that such a devil of a noise arose that none of our neighbours could hear a word of the drama, at which not being highly delighted they began to quarrel with us and we nearly came to a battle royal.”
They didn’t have to worry about disturbing the neighbours at Lord’s on Friday, because there weren’t any. It may be a small crowd but the fixture is loathed by the stewards. Last year one of the boys even started letting off flares. The two schools had taken measures to prevent similar behaviour this time. The kids were all kept in separate tiers of separate stands, while the only nearby toilets were closed off, and each lot directed to their own block to prevent them from mingling. The rumour was that the schools had even set up a detention room elsewhere on the site.
The groundstaff didn’t seem terribly keen on any of it either, given that they had 22 school children trampling all over the square they’re trying to prepare for the two Test matches they’re playing here in the next six weeks. They did such a thorough job of covering the pitch from the lick of drizzle that fell in the morning, which was barely enough to make you wipe your spectacles, that you wondered if they were trying to drop everyone a hint. If they were, no one took it.
