A fatal shot
The sad death of Australian batsman Philip Hughes was a reminder that a cricket ball can kill. A blow on the cricket field may even have cost us an heir to the throne.
— One of the earliest suspected victims was Frederick, Prince of Wales, the son of George II, who is first recorded as having played cricket in 1733 when he put up a team against Sir William Gage, in a match played on Mouley Hurst, Surrey.
— In 1751, a few weeks after his 44th birthday, he was said to be suffering from an abscess in the chest caused by a blow by a cricket ball, or possibly a real tennis ball. He then caught a chill and developed pleurisy. He died on 31 March after the abscess burst.
Best case scenarios
Some ways to spend £3 million (other than on a court case to decide whether someone called someone a ‘pleb’):
— Buying Sir Cliff Richard’s Berkshire penthouse, for sale after the police raid.
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