David Parkin loses a name-dropping contest

HEARD the one about the Hollywood star, the pig farmer and the British ambassador?

I hadn’t until I went to Scarborough this week.

The annual Scarborough Cricket Festival is currently running - a month-long celebration of Yorkshire cricket and its long connection to the seaside resort.

One of the regular sponsors at the event is Andrew Jackson Solicitors, the 150-year-old firm with offices in Hull, York, Scarborough and Grimsby and as part of its community outreach programme, it invites me to the cricket for a day every summer.

Partner Chris Waterhouse, business development director Adam “The Saint” Sinclair and managing partner Mark Pearson-Kendall and their colleagues are welcoming and generous hosts and always bring together an interesting gathering of guests in the hospitality marquee at the historic cricket ground at North Marine Road.

One of the first people I met was a tall chap who was nervously checking his phone.

It turns out he had just sold the business he’d started 30 years ago and was waiting for the money to be paid into his bank account.

I’ve interviewed countless entrepreneurs who have done big deals but I’ve never been there at the point when the fruit of their labours actually drops into their hands.

Talking of successful entrepreneurs, Phillip Hodson built a hugely successful insurance business called Oval and is also a former chairman of the MCC.

He and his wife Sally Ann, sister of former England cricket captain Tony Greig, are regulars at Scarborough and I bumped into them sitting in the sunshine sitting next to legendary umpire Dickie Bird, who looks fit as a fiddle at 93.

Sally Ann told me that both she and Phillip have endured huge health challenges in recent years - he with cancer and she was one of the first people to be diagnosed with Covid back in March 2020.

She spent five weeks on a ventilator, mostly in an induced coma and was given a 20% chance of survival.

But Sally Ann pulled through and was described as a “walking miracle” when she left hospital and was later interviewed by Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid on Good Morning Britain alongside the hospital staff who cared for her.

When lunch was served inside the marquee we were welcomed by Yorkshire and England batting legend Sir Geoffrey Boycott who told a story about the Yorkshireman whose name I can’t remember who first brought cricket to Scarborough.

Sir Geoff said that according to legend this cricketer once hit a ball over the pavilion at Lord’s, although he couldn’t be sure it was true.

He said he hoped everyone enjoyed lunch, which he described as “the best spread in cricket”.

“And I should know, I’ve tried them all for the last 25 years!”

I was sitting next to a chap who is the chairman of governors at Hymers College.

If you’ve not heard of Hymers before it is Hull’s answer to Eton.

John Kittmer is a former diplomat, a fluent Greek speaker and historian who was once Britain’s ambassador to Greece.

I asked him for his tips on the best islands to visit in Greece and wondered whether his job had involved visiting some of the tourist resorts on the Greek Islands which attract thousands of young British tourists every summer.

Corfu has Kavos, Crete has Malia and I told John I’d once visited Faliraki on Rhodes back in my 20s.

I remember walking down the main street with music blaring in my ears from bars on either side of the road as young, mainly British holidaymakers stumbled around me.

I do believe drink had been taken.

John told me that the locals have since taken steps to calm its reputation as a party town.

I described it as a “fleshpot”, but with typical diplomacy, he corrected me and said it was a “youth entertainment resort”.

Another of the guests on our table told me he worked in agriculture in North Yorkshire.

When I asked what type of farming he did, he replied: “Pigs”.

I asked him how many pigs were on his farm and he furrowed his brow.

“Are you counting how many you’ve got?” I said flippantly.

“No, I’m just wondering whether I should tell you how many…400,000,” he said.

With the kind of incisive intelligence and shrewd judgement for which I’ve become known, I replied: “That’s a big pig farm.”

After a delayed start due to a damp outfield, play got goingand after lunch I took the opportunity to go over to the stands to meet my former Yorkshire Post colleagues, Sam Wheeler and Richard Sutcliffe.

Sam, the paper’s former rugby union correspondent, was my lodger for five years and now lives in his native Ireland where he works on the agricultural pages of the Irish Independent while Richard who covered Sheffield United and Leeds United at the YP, is now a writer for the excellent sports website The Athletic.

He has covered Wrexham’s remarkable rise from non-league to the Championship under Hollywood actor owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney.

“Are you enjoying the hospitality in the marquee, Parky?” asked Sutty.

I said I was and had enjoyed talking to big names like Dickie Bird and Sir Geoffrey Boycott.

“It sounds a bit like the time I was invited in Ryan Reynolds’ box at Wrexham and was sat next to Will Ferrell,” replied Richard.

I decided I wasn’t going to win a name-dropping contest and as a light drizzle started to descend and supporters scurried for cover, I said I was going to return to the marquee for an early tee as there was a cream scone with my name on it.

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I’M indebted to a reader for helping me out of a quandary.

In last week’s blog I mentioned that on a previous visit to the Great Yorkshire Show I had seen a performance by a horseman with flowing black hair, tight jodhpurs and white tunic unbuttoned to the waist who rode into the arena on a carriage pulled by a team of white horses.

I thought his name was Fernando but when I Googled it I could find no reference to the great equine cavalier, which made me worry it was all a fantasy cooked up by my subconscious mind.

Fortunately for me dealmaker and investor Xavier Adam sent me a link to a website for international horseman Lorenzo.

So I’d just got his name wrong, not imagined it all, which is a relief.

And if your name is Xavier and you live in Yorkshire then you might be a bit of a performer yourself.

Which I can’t confirm or deny, but I did once see him pulling wheelies on his Raleigh Chopper outside Hotel du Vin.

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IT is a brilliant communications masterstroke if you ask me.

When I heard that “resident doctors” were going out on a five-day strike this week in search of a pay rise I immediately thought it was another bolshie bunch of members of the BMA.

What I didn’t realise is that it is the same bolshie bunch who the new Labour government handed a 22% pay rise to last year to cover the previous two years and who are getting another 5.4% increase this year.

At the same time as securing their big back-dated pay hike, junior doctors, a name long derided as not being appropriate, was replaced with the new description of “resident doctors”.

Junior doctors had carried out 12 walkouts under the previous Tory government which had put even more pressure on the creaking NHS.

But I do think they had a large degree of public support and we’ve had 12 months without any strikes.

After a 22% pay rise, I wonder whether the public will still have sympathy for their plight following their latest strike, which started this morning?

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IT is the de rigueur thing to do on social media this summer.

I’m sure you’ve seen it.

The new phenomenon of middle aged people posting photographs of themselves at the Glastonbury Festival and the Oasis reunion concerts.

They don’t look smug in the slightest and I’m very pleased for them.

Someone asked me if I was going to any of the Oasis reunion gigs.

I don’t really think it’s for me.

I was a bit overwhelmed by the crowds and the noise when I went to see The Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain at the Grassington Festival.

Have a great weekend.