Cricket is hit by curse of the yobs

The leafy Walker Ground was the unlikely focal point on Monday night for a sobering reminder that cricket has encouraged a yob element as well as a new family audience with the success of the Twenty20 format.

Scroll down to read more:

While the rain-affected game itself passed off peacefully, there was trouble just before its conclusion when an intruder broke into the Middlesex dressing room and stole players' valuables while the Hampshire side refused to sign autographs as a protest at the treatment they received at the hands of a drunken few.

Nic Pothas, Hampshire's Twenty20 captain, was furious.

"What kind of an animal spits on someone?" he said. "What kind of people steal from a dressing room? The Southgate outfield was unfit for play but the players made an effort to get out there in conditions that were dangerous for us to put a game on and this is the thanks we get."

Pothas, standing in for regular Hampshire captain Shane Warne, defended his team's decision not to sign autographs, even for young spectators.

"Players have to take a stand," he said. "Last year one of our players, Dom Thorneley, was smacked by a spectator at Sussex but we can't do anything. It's all very unfortunate."

Middlesex were adamant that this was an isolated incident and blamed the stone throwing on someone in the cemetery next door to the ground rather than at the match.

However, Middlesex chief executive Vinny Codrington said. "We try everything we can to make sure there are no problems, but stewarding the outgrounds is not easy.

"We've not had trouble before. Hampshire wisely locked their dressing room and had nothing taken. Unfortunately, ours wasn't locked and two or three of the lads had their wallets stolen."

This may have been a relatively minor incident but cricket treads a fine line between a healthy atmosphere and one that can be soured by the excesses of alcohol, particularly among the 'football-type' spectators who have been attracted by the instant thrill of Twenty20 cricket.

A boorish atmosphere in several stands was noticeable at this season's Headingley and Old Trafford Tests, and the England and Wales Cricket Board are well aware that crowd behaviour is a sensitive issue.

Six years ago there were serious incidents of unruly crowd trouble during Pakistan's tour of England, particularly at Old Trafford, and fences were even considered to keep spectators off the outfield.

Thankfully, it proved to be an extreme example of cricket behaviour rather than a growing trend and since then, even after the 2003 introduction of Twenty20, incidents have been relatively few.

Respected cricket photographer Graham Morris has long insisted that cricket crowds need to be monitored carefully.

He said: "I've had all sorts of stuff thrown at me sitting on the edge of the outfield and encountered all sorts of verbal abuse, just as the players have.

"It is not so much directed at me and the other photographers as anyone who is in front of the crowd. I'm not being puritanical but it does go hand in hand with booze."

Morris, the chairman of the Cricket Writers Club, excludes Lord's from his criticism of spectators and says that Manchester and Leeds are by far the worst grounds at which to ply his trade.

He said: "There are incidents virtually everywhere there's a big crowd at a cricket ground these days except Lord's and I'm sure that's because they still let people bring in their own alcohol at Lord's. If people can do that they just bring in their bottle of wine, or whatever, and pace themselves. At other grounds they are not allowed to bring their own booze in but they can buy as much as they like in the ground. It seems to bring the worst out of a lot of them."

An ECB spokesman said that, as Middlesex had not reported Monday's trouble to them, they would leave the investigation to them. He added: "If either of the counties want us to look into it we will do but at the moment it remains a matter for Middlesex."