Long Room

The Long Room is a notable, historic room at Lord's cricket ground, in St John's Wood, London.

The Long Room in the Lords pavilion

Described by Lawrence Booth as "the most evocative four walls in world cricket",[1] the Long Room is situated in the Pavilion.

Function

Players walk through the Long Room on their way from the dressing rooms to the cricket field; this walk is notoriously long and complex at Lord's. On his Test debut in 1975, David Steele got lost "and ended up in the pavilion's basement toilets".[1]

Members of MCC and their guests have free access to the room (there are windows with views of the ground) and will often greet Australian batsmen with "witticisms ... like 'See you soon'".[1] On this point, Australian Justin Langer,[2] described walking through the Long Room like "being bearhugged by an invisible spirit".[1]

As a result of the Pakistan cricket spot-fixing scandal, news of which broke on the last morning of the 2010 Lord's Test match, the presentation ceremony at the end of the match (and series) was held in the Long Room, rather than on the pitch.

The Long Room has recently been made available on a private hire basis for events such as weddings and conferences.[3]

Decor

The Long Room is lined with paintings of famous cricketers and administrators, from the 18th century to the 21st. For contemporary or overseas players to have their portrait placed here is a considerable honour and very few have been awarded this distinction. For example, only four Australian cricketers have ever been honoured in this way: Sir Donald Bradman, Keith Miller, Victor Trumper and Shane Warne,[4][5][6] the only one of the four to have played international cricket in the last 60 years.[7]

References
  1. Arm-Ball to Zooter, Lawrence Booth, Penguin 2006, ISBN 0-14-051581-X, p.150-1
  2. Langer also played at Lord's on many occasions as a (home) Middlesex player
  3. "United Kingdom: The Long Room : Events Hire". Retrieved 17 Feb 2014.
  4. The following sources are, respectively, a Miller obituary from 2004, which lists Trumper and Bradman and a further piece from 2005, when Warne's portrait was added. Michael Atherton, the author of the second piece, curiously overlooks Trumper's portrait; other articles of the same period do similarly.
  5. Selvey, Mike (2004-10-12). "Obituary: Keith Miller". London: The Guardian. Retrieved 2008-01-14.
  6. Atherton, Michael (2005-06-12). "Warne: still the incomparable master of spin bowler's craft". The Daily Telegraph. London. Retrieved 2010-05-11.
  7. Miller's last Test was in 1956. Only Warne, born in 1969 with a Test career from 1992–2007, has played more recently.

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