Sport & Fitness

It’s my job to deal with everything except the pitch at Lord’s. That’s the buildings, utilities, infrastructure, security and stewarding. My day begins at about 7.30am and I divide my time between the office, meeting consultants and contractors and working on site.

I started in October 2005, immediately after England won the Ashes. The buzz around the ground lasted for months. I took the job because it’s a unique challenge. Previously, I was a general manager on contract to the Ministry of Defence, looking after a site for 1,000 scientific staff. The MCC is a completely different environment. The politics, rather than the technicalities, are the day-to-day challenge. We spend a lot of time consulting.
Feature continues

I’m not a massive cricket fan. But I am getting into it. I used to play semi-pro football for Salisbury City for many years and I’m a lifelong Manchester United supporter, which makes four of us in the same office. The one who’s not is a Chelsea fan, which guarantees some interesting Monday-morning banter.

During my first season at Lord’s
I learned that the average cricket fan will drink all day. But they know how to enjoy themselves without getting out of hand. For them, a day here can be one huge party. The atmosphere at a big match is pretty special.

During major matches, the MCC has a standard dress code. Outside of these, a suit is required of the male members of staff. There are many rules, as you would expect, but there is also a refreshing lack of bureaucracy. A contradiction unique to the MCC, perhaps.

Our annual spend on ground improvements and maintenance is about £4.5 million. One of the bigger projects at the moment is reseating the Tavern, Allen and parts of the Mound Stands with padded chairs and armrests. I hope we’re setting new standards of comfort at cricket grounds. Another is replacing the big screens for the 2008
season. All three will be able to run TV and ads, as well as being used as conventional scoreboards.

After last year’s hurricane we had to re-roof the Tavern Stand. I was in St John’s Wood High Street getting some lunch when a call came through. I ran all the way back to Lord’s to find two parked cars completely buried in asphalt. Amazingly, no one was seriously hurt in the incident but the road was blocked into the early hours. Replacing the roof had to be done from a standing start in double-quick time to be ready for the new season.

We clean the outside of the Media Centre once or twice a year. It’s a job for specialist contractors and takes four men up to four days to complete. Among their techniques is abseiling up and down the outside.

I’m looking forward to our ‘Globe at Lord’s’ project. It’s still in the early planning stage, but ‘Romeo & Juliet’ should be a hot ticket for early summer on the pitch.

If I were to get a moment on a Test match day, the top of the Mound Stand is the place to be. It’s beautifully open and bright, with its iconic tented roof and a perfect side-on view of the wicket.

Click here for details of Middlesex’s matches at Lord’s this week. Visit www.lords.org for information about major matches (tickets are still available for the fourth day of the England v West Indies Test match on May 20), visiting the MCC Museum and tours of the ground.