On 4 August 1975, during the second Ashes Test at Lord's, a 24-year-old merchant seaman from Liverpool named Michael Angelow leapt the boundary fence wearing only socks and trainers, hurdled both sets of stumps to the amusement of the players, and was wrestled to the ground by police. He had taken a £20 bet from his shipmates. He was fined £20 in court the next morning, and the BBC commentary by John Arlott — "we have got a freaker, not very shapely, and it is masculine — and I would think it has seen the last of its cricket for the day" — became one of the most replayed pieces of cricket commentary of the decade.
Streaking had become a sporadic feature of British public life in 1974-75. The first major sporting streaker had been Michael O'Brien at Twickenham in 1974, the iconic photograph showing a policeman's helmet covering his modesty. The 1975 Ashes was unusual in scheduling and in atmosphere — the first World Cup had finished six weeks earlier at the same ground, attracting a younger and more festive crowd, and cricket attendance was higher than at any time since the war.
Angelow had no preexisting interest in cricket. His shipmates' bet was, by his later account, the only reason he was on the ground.
The Test was a working-day Monday, the second day of the match. Lord's was full. The Tavern Stand, where Angelow had been drinking, was the most boisterous part of the ground. Cricinfo's later research established that the bet was placed during the lunch interval and that Angelow had accepted only after a second pint.
His run took roughly fifteen seconds. The square-leg umpire, David Constant, gestured to the constables at the boundary. McCosker, the non-striker, was reported to have laughed and said "I think we will let him through".
The Lord's Test was the second of a four-match series, played a fortnight after Australia had won the first at Edgbaston. England had been bowled out for 315 in the first innings; the streaker came onto the field at the start of Australia's reply, after the lunch interval. Angelow, on shore leave from a merchant ship, had been in the Tavern with shipmates and had accepted a £20 wager.
He left his clothes on the boundary, vaulted the fence, and ran towards the wicket. Both batsmen — Greg Chappell and Rick McCosker — and the close fielders watched. Angelow hurdled both sets of stumps and was tackled by a constable, who was photographed using his helmet to preserve modesty. He was led off through the Long Room.
The next morning, fined £20 at Marlborough Street magistrates' court, he handed the magistrate the £20 won from the bet to settle the fine. Cricket's governing bodies introduced no immediate counter-measures; Angelow's run was the first streaking incident at Lord's, though there had been one at Eden Park in Auckland during a 1974 Australia-New Zealand Test.
Lunch interval: bet placed in the Tavern, £20 stake
Angelow vaults fence on the Tavern side
Hurdles both sets of stumps
Tackled by constable; photograph with helmet placed across the body
Led off through the Long Room
Marlborough Street magistrates' court next morning: fined £20
31 July 1975
Lord's Test begins
4 August 1975 (lunch)
£20 bet placed in the Tavern
4 August 1975 (afternoon)
Angelow streaks across the wicket; hurdles both sets of stumps
5 August 1975 (morning)
Marlborough Street magistrates' court — fined £20
“We have got a freaker — not very shapely, and it is masculine, and I would think it has seen the last of its cricket for the day. He has now removed his shirt — I have no idea what is going to happen.”
The match itself was drawn. Angelow returned to his ship and was, until journalists tracked him down for the 30th anniversary in 2005, largely lost to the cricket archive. He was later identified as living in the West Indies, where he ran a small hotel.
Lord's introduced no specific anti-streaker measure. The next streaking incident at the ground occurred in the 1990s and was met with the same combination of police response and public amusement.
Match drawn (in cricket terms). Angelow fined £20 — exactly the amount of his winnings. The incident is now part of Lord's lore and is referenced in the MCC's published history.
The Arlott commentary — captured live on BBC radio — is the durable artefact of the day. Played on every BBC cricket-anniversary documentary since, the line "we have got a freaker" has acquired the status of a comic catchphrase. The photograph of the constable with his helmet placed across Angelow has been reprinted in almost every history of Lord's published since 1980.
The incident is also remembered as the moment at which one strand of British cricketing solemnity — the Lord's Long Room, the MCC dress code, the stewards' deportment — was definitively pierced by the more anarchic public culture of the mid-1970s.
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