English cricket, in its joyless pursuit of moral purity, has banned naughty jokes. There can be no other explanation for its punishment of Phillip Hodson, a man who has given his life to the summer game as player, administrator, and benefactor, and now finds himself fined £1,000.

Hodson, a former president of Marylebone Cricket Club, which owns Lord’s, and serves as custodian of the game’s laws, has been named, shamed, and forced to cough up for saying the kind of things at a cricket dinner that people have been saying at cricket dinners since W.G. Grace shook crumbs from that famous beard.

Many people who run English cricket are so concerned by the game’s image, and by perceptions of its history, that forms of re-education are now considered necessary

Hodson, who was also deputy-chairman of Yorkshire, made the remarks last July at Scarborough, the club that lends its ground to Yorkshire for a week of festival cricket. Scarborough, one of the great places to watch cricket, has long been associated with fun and frolics. That the club continues to stage first-class cricket is down to people like Hodson, who put their own money behind it.

Cricket-lovers from all over England, and beyond, flock to the seaside every summer, and hitherto nobody has been known to complain about a bit of fruity language.

Regular attenders of those dinners will recognise Hodson’s words, and the spirit in which he uttered them. Noting that he had spoken recently at a local haemorrhoid society, and also a meeting ‘of the Gay Liberation Front’, he told guests that ‘it’s gratifying to see so many........

© The Spectator