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Start the Car: The World According to Bumble
David Lloyd
Welcome to the weird and wonderful world of "Bumble", the legendary SkySports cricket commentator who's one ball short of an over and delivers madcap moments galore in this ebullient, endearing and hilarious book.David "Bumble" Lloyd is a legend in our living rooms, a genuine "good bloke" all cricket fans feel they know inside out because of his infectious, larger-than-life personality and that distinctive Lancashire burr.Bumble has become the one constant for passionate English fans in cricket's rapidly changing landscape. He has earned cult status as a commentator and pundit, with viewers loving his unerring dedication to the game's great fables.The World According to Bumble: Start the Car revels in the quirkier and humorous side of cricket, while offering behind-the-scenes action of Lloyd's years spent following cricket around the globe, from Accrington to Lahore.Bumble waxes lyrical on everything from the genius of Shane Warne to the merits of a Lancashire hotpot … and the delights of finishing the day with a couple of pints and a curry.Enjoy the camaraderie that exists among the SkySports team - including former England captains Sir Ian Botham, Michael Atherton, Nasser Hussain and David Gower - and laugh out loud at the stories and anecdotes which have forged Bumble's character.Whether he is holding up play to retrieve lost balls from the top of sight-screens, or enacting mock pitch reports from car parks, Bumble is capable of stealing the limelight at all times.



The World According to Bumble
Start the Car
David Lloyd



Dedication (#ulink_486909a5-fb84-5db5-85ba-ca0b7ba0bad8)
To Diana, Tags, Susan, Phil, Steven, Ben, Spike, Graham, Sharon, Joseph, Joshua, Freddie, Sarah, Enty, Sam, James and Jasmine. Hope you enjoy it!

Contents
Title Page (#uf8fbdbcd-fa91-5c92-a161-d146ca8f7a55)
Dedication
Introduction
Part 1 – In the Box
1 That Bloke off the Telly
2 The Sky Larks
3 Ranting, Raving and Reviewing
4 Life’s Tweet
5 It’s Not What You Say
Part 2 – In the Middle
6 Brushed up in Mönchengladbach
7 The Men in White Coats
8 Loose Lipped but Card Sharp
9 Twenty20 Kicks Ass
10 The Crown Jewels
11 Crowded Streets, Lonely Hearts, Alarm Clocks and Snakes
Part 3 – In the Blood
12 Get ’Em In!
13 Ian Rush? Who’s He? Exactly!
14 Hit for Six by a Pensioner
15 Hitting Sixties
16 Ooh, What a Ding-Dong Du
17 I’m Dreaming of a Hot Christmas
18 Suck-it-and-see Motoring
19 Every Slumdog Has Its Day
20 Birdies, Eagles and Mallards
21 The Million that Got Away
22 Hit the North
23 Bumble for Prime Minister
24 The Regiment
Photographic Insert
Acknowledgements
What next? (#u8e5c398a-8c65-5f2f-937a-a682377a32f4)
About the Authors
Copyright
About the Publisher

Introduction
Thanks for buying this book. The proceeds will go to a very good cause, namely the David Lloyd Retirement Fund, and, I assure you, will be redistributed to numerous outlets, in various personal pursuits across the globe. Oh, and rest easy in the knowledge that I will have fun doing so.
Of course, you might not have put your hand in your pocket to purchase this, so, for those of you who have received it as a gift on Father’s Day, on a birthday or at Christmas and want to pretend you have ploughed from cover to cover; for those of you who really like the thought of reading but never venture much further than the introduction; for those of you who normally do but find it to be the kind of book you just can’t pick up after putting down; for those of you who thought you were investing in the life story of some bloke involved in top-level tennis; for those of you wanting to know no more than the secrets of my successful leisure club empire (you’ll be sadly disappointed); for those of you whose concentration spans waver after a tweet or two; for those of you who have picked this up in the smallest room during a break between courses at a friend’s dinner party – here is the deal. Pretty much every essential detail you need to know about me is listed below. Welcome, however briefly, to my world.
My 50 Favourite Things
Career moment (playing): My 214 not out against India, Edgbaston, 1974
Career moment (broadcasting): Yuvraj Singh’s six sixes in an over off Stuart Broad, World Twenty20, 2007
Opponent: Joel Garner. He would bowl me out with a bath sponge
Team-mate: Graham Lloyd
Modern player: Can’t separate Virender Sehwag and Kevin Pietersen
Cricket ground: Sydney
Football team: Accrington Stanley
Footballer: Duncan Edwards
Holiday destination: St Ives, Cornwall
Tipple: A pint of Black Sheep or Timmy T’s
Meal: Chicken Madras with naan and lime pickle
Country: United Kingdom
Insect: Ladybirds are OK
Saying: ‘Don’t let the bastards grind you down’
Animal: Dog
Pastime: Fishing
Personal item: Motorbike
Boyhood hero: Ken Barrington
Book: Tragically, I Was an Only Twin – Peter Cook
Film: Brassed Off
Band: The Fall
Album: Imperial Wax Solvent – The Fall
Motorway: M6 toll road
River: Wye
Hotel: Lygon Arms, Chipping Campden
Mode of transport: Bike
Season: Spring
Beatles or Stones? Stones
Colour: Black
Decade: 1960s
Restaurant: J Sheekey, Covent Garden, London
Pub: The Hesketh Tavern, Cheadle Hulme
Advice received: ‘Be yourself’ – my dad
Advice given: ‘If you are a politician, don’t knock on my door’
Cake: Fruitcake
Flower: Rose
Number: 134
Condiment: Lancashire Sauce
Board game: Cluedo
Gadget: Chainsaw
Film star: Ray Winstone or Russell Crowe
TV soap: Emmerdale
Politician: Not one of them cheating, conniving, low-down dregs of the earth
Cricket tour: New Zealand
City: Manchester
Car: Audi
Memory: Loss of
Piece of trivia: Monaco’s army is smaller than its symphony orchestra
Comedian: Tommy Cooper
Joke: My granny started jogging in 1998 … we have no idea where she is now.

PART ONE

Chapter 1
THAT BLOKE OFF THE TELLY
Being on television inevitably means you get recognised by people when you are out and about. It is something you become accustomed to, and I have never really had a problem with it, although I did once get freaked out when a bloke came straight out with ‘You’re David Lloyd, aren’t you?’ Because when I say I am recognised, I genuinely am – only never as myself. I have had Rasputin (he had a massive beard, didn’t he?), Tony Blair and Alan Titchmarsh over the years. Nice to know I have made such a good impression.
To be fair, at least it is normally another famous face from the world of cricket that I get. Although with my specs on I also encountered one of the more bizarre shouts. An Australian bloke walked up to me in a pub in Manchester and did a double take. ‘Hey, I know you, you look like one of the Proclaimers,’ he said, his forehead crumpling in thought. ‘What do you mean, one of the Proclaimers?’ I protested. ‘I either look like both of them or none of them. They’re bloody identical twins! Or they were the last time I looked.’
It is not as though this identity crisis has hit me solely since I hooked up in the Sky commentary box, either. Now I come to think of it, it has followed me around since my playing days. When I signed for Cumberland in early 1985, I was asked to do a local radio interview over the telephone. We went through the usual rigmarole of how the move had come about, what offers had surfaced elsewhere, how I saw the side’s chances that summer and what role I would fulfil within it.
It was a pleasant enough chat, and the interviewer wound down with a final question: ‘Do you think you will adapt to the Cumbrian north-west weather again quickly after spending so much time in the Caribbean?’ The silly sod had got me mixed up with my brother Clive. I put him right, of course, and following a lengthy pause I heard his muffled voice relay the information to his producer: ‘Hey, they’ve only gone and signed the wrong one!’ I had some great times with Clive at Old Trafford, he has been a great pal, and he still lives down the road, but fancy getting a pasty bloke like him mixed up with a bronze Adonis like myself!
Nowhere are people more cricket daft than India, and appropriately it is there that I have experienced some of the daftest shouts. One chap in Rajkot was overjoyed when I agreed to pose with him for a picture at the airport. ‘You are my most good commentator Sky Sport,’ he told me, through clenched teeth, as we grimaced for the first snap. After seven more shots, I made my excuses and left. ‘Thank you, Mr Paul Arlott,’ he said. ‘For being my friend.’
Now they don’t get a great deal of international cricket in Rajkot, I grant you, so the locals tend to get excitable when a game comes to town. After England were trounced there in the winter of 2008–9, I was asked for more photos at the ground. I was only too happy to oblige until the chap pointing the camera said: ‘Excuse me, Mr Duncan Fletcher, look this way please.’ There must have been a particularly virulent strain of this eye infection going around, as later that evening came a knock at my hotel door. Three chaps were standing outside and greeted me with: ‘You are our favourite umpire, Mr Hair.’ And you can imagine the levels of my paranoia when even the hotel staff weighed in. Upon checking out next morning, the receptionist said to me: ‘Thank you for staying with us in Rajkot, Mr Bruce Yardley.’ I was glad to get out.
This was enough to put a chap permanently on edge. In Bangalore, one autograph hunter instructed me: ‘Please sign this, Tony Greig.’ So I did exactly that to get my own back. OK, Greigy was a former England captain, but he is six foot four and speaks with an unmistakable South African accent. I undoubtedly preferred the next error, as I left the ground in Chennai during a pre-Christmas Test match. ‘You are most famous English Mike Brearley,’ I was unequivocally told. I gave myself the once over, confirmed in my own mind I was not, but appreciated being thought of on the same intellectual level. If you are involved in mistaken identity it’s always better if it paints you in a decent light.
And you can also have some fun. Whenever we are in Leeds for a Test match, I make a dash for the Princess of Wales pub and sink a pint or three. A group of us were in there one year when a rather big Yorkshire lass, bedecked with tattoos from head to toe, sauntered up and barked: ‘You’re the commentator, aren’t you?’ She was quite an intimidating sight – supping a pint like a rugby front-rower between sentences – so I meekly replied, ‘Yes, I am.’
‘I just wanted to say I love you on Test Match Special, Jonathan,’ she continued. Jolly nice of her to say so, I thought, as I subtly brought up Agnew’s number on my phone, passed it on to her and suggested she give me a call any time she needed tickets.

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