Who’s the Daddy now then?

The first is that he'd only arrived at Newcastle Airport at 10am that morning after an 18- hour journey from Florida. "I just hoped we'd win the toss and bat," says Simon, 28. "I don't think I could have stayed awake if we hadn't."

The second, yet more remarkable, is that Simon's place in the A division records emulates his dad, John - whose undefeated 208 in 1994 remains the highest individual score, seconds' best, in the B division.

"He's been going on about it for the last 14 years," says Simon, who earlier this season had hit an undefeated 120 against Mainsforth in a 20-over cup match.

"Too true I have," says John, 59 and still playing for the second team. "I don't think he was as bothered about beating the league record as he was about beating mine."

The 269 was the highest score in Durham County League history, beating Jim Allenby's 266 for Brandon against Langley Park in 2005. Simon's 279 partnership with Stephen Thompson was also a league second wicket record. Tudhoe closed on a cub record 373-3.

The omniscient Jack Chapman points out that the highest score by any Durham club player is E W Elliot's 332 for Borderers, against Newcastle Garrison, in 1905.

Simon's towering total included 19 sixes and 23 fours, the ball disappearing to all parts of a Tudhoe ground hitherto best known for being the inadvertent target of a German buzz bomb attack on Christmas Eve 1944. It's said they were aiming for Manchester.

Simon, seeing it like a Doodlebug, had been on business in Tampa for Crafters' Companion, the company set up by his wife in Coundon, near Bishop Auckland. He flew back via Detroit and Amsterdam.

"It's always worse returning west to east, but it doesn't really kick in until the following day,"

he says.

"Sometimes you go out to bat and can't hit anything, sometimes you can't seem to miss. It was just one of those days. They had almost everyone on the boundary, otherwise it could have been more.

"There was a missed stumping when I was 30 and a dropped catch on 180, but otherwise I didn't do too badly."

The entire ground aware that the record was in sight, he needed three from the final over - but with partner Dave Ronson on strike.

"Davey said he'd just touch the first ball for one and it went for four," says Simon. "Luckily he got a single off the next."

John, familiar as a Spennymoor United footballer until he retired at 29 - "I had my own building business, I couldn't afford to break my leg"

- has played Tudhoe cricket since he was 13.

He hit an undefeated 205 against Ushaw Moor II in 1994 and the following week again broke the divisional record, the 208 coming against Hetton Lyons.

On the afternoon that the lad went for broke, he was playing in the corresponding second team fixture at Mainsforth - scoring just five. He managed 82 not out on Monday, though.

"I saw Simon before Saturday's match and his eyes looked totally bleary. I told him he'd never stay awake but obviously he did.

"I'm just a hitter, Simon's both a strike player and a hitter.

I'm delighted he beat the league record, because I don't think it will ever be beaten, it's just a pity that he had to beat mine.

The tricky bit is to score two successive double hundreds."

By Tuesday, however, Simon was again off on his travels - we found him in Germany - and will miss tomorrow's match.

Good night last Saturday, then? "To be honest I was shattered," he says. "I had to field for their 45 overs, then I went straight to bed and slept like a log till next morning."

AFTER one of Mainsforth Cricket Club's less glorious afternoons, it's melancholy coincidence to report the passing of Bob Welsh, perhaps that club's greatest servant. He was 92.

"He lived for cricket, loved watching any good game," says Alan Campbell, his nephew and himself a once-familiar fast bowler at Bishop Auckland.

"He'd have enjoyed watching Simon Davies, but just wished he'd played for Mainsforth."

We'd caught up with Bob in May 2006, the gold clock presentation for 80 years service to the club, whose ground is in Ferryhill Station.

It could have been longer than 80, he'd supposed, had they counted the time when, as a four-year-old, he'd been seated on the donkey that pulled the mower and left there all morning.

"I came off unable to stand.

They had to carry me home,"

he said. Home, happily, was straight across the road. His mum made the cricket club teas, his dad helped on the ground.

Bob had started as a sort-of ball boy for the nets, progressed arithmetically from third to second to first teams, became umpire, juniors coach, club treasurer and president.

"He was a gentle man, loved this place," says club secretary John Irvine. "Whether you'd done well or badly as a player you always got the same laconic smile. Bob had been there before."

When 17, he'd also played Northern League football for Chilton Colliery - "I wasn't even signed on," he said, oblivious to rights and wrong uns - and later in the North Eastern League for Spennymoor.

Fifty years a colliery mechanic, he'd earned a few bob pocket money covering Ferryhill Athletic for the Pink.

"It was a funny old business,"

he'd recalled, like match correspondents before him.

"The first half hour when nothing much usually happened, they wanted 200 words. The last 20 minutes, when it got exciting, they wanted 20 words."

Freda, his wife, had been Ferryhill correspondent for all the local papers. She died in 2005.

Probably his most exciting cricket match was a Saunders Cup semi-final at home to Durham City, 1,000 around the ground - "I was treasurer, I counted them."

In those days they'd pass the cap around the ground if anyone hit a half century. Bob managed 47. "Three more runs, 1,000 people, I could have made my fortune."

Though unwell, he still attended matches when he could, always with his younger brother Fred. "If I'm feeling down, if lifts me up just to walk through those gates," he'd said.

Bob's funeral will be at Ferryhill Methodist church, which he loved and served, at 9 45am next Tuesday.

BACKTRACK BRIEFS...

A POIGNANT little note, following Tuesday's piece on the Subbuteo tournament, from David Wright in Bishop Auckland. Like a lot of dads, David had been looking forward to playing against his son.

"I bought the all-star version featuring players from all over Europe. We set it up, played it once, and never got it out of the box again. The truth is that it's pretty rubbish compared to a Playstation."

Not to be beaten, David then bought the latest FIFA Street - "complete with a freakish Peter Crouch" - and has played that just once, too.

"It seems that Josi is a modern rarity, who'd rather be out kicking a ball or on his bike. I suppose that's great, but I still don't have anyone to play with."

THE same table-top column noted that the Subbuteo Scots were drinking something called Carling top. "The North- East equivalent is a pint touch," translates Davie Munday in Dunfermline, via Darlington.

Davie's also interested in last week's report of the Escape Committee's visit to Camelon, a suburb of Falkirk.

Maybe it's because we weren't over-impressed that he recalls the burgh's ancient motto: "Better meddle with the de'il than the bairns of Falkirk."

The pies still weren't up to much, mind.

PERHAPS a bit of a cry from the heart, too, from our old friend John Armstrong - at 63 still turning over his arm for Etherley II.

John's the chap, it may be recalled, who broke the other arm after being assaulted by a flying sight screen at Shildon Railway.

By the time he got on to bowl last Saturday, Brandon II were 250-odd. "The skipper likes to keep me for later, which at 63 seems a bit of a risky strategy, particularly in view of my history with sight screens," he says.

Danny Hinge, the captain, is sympathetic. "We have a lot of keen youngsters and I have to try to give everyone a go," he says. "We try not to let John field in the deep."

THE opposite problem for Over 40s League secretary Kip Watson. Faced with a player - Alan White of Hartlepool Catholic Club - who thinks it might be prudent to hang up his boots at 55, Kips been going through the registrations.

The league has three Over 70s, nine more players on the high side of 65 and 114 between 55 and 64.

The secretary hopes he's made his point. "Reaching 55 isn't the end," he says. "It's only just the beginning." Kip Watson is 90.

GORDON Bradley, the Easington miner who became one of America's top soccer coaches, has had a fitting sendoff.

Hundreds attended a memorial service in the States. "The stories flowed for many a long hour into the night," reports Michael Duff, Gordon's nephew, from Hartlepool.

"If there were tears, they tears of laughter at some of the old Gordonisms."

Gordon, whose death we reported on May 16, became an American citizen but retained his passion for English football - from Arsenal to Annfield Plain.

"He was always watching matches on television, subscribed to all sorts of satellite channels just to get his fix and God forbid if you were in his way when one of the big matches was on," says Michael.

We've also heard from Fred Birtle, who wonders why the column didn't mention the happy Windy Ridge seasons that Gordon spent with Stanley United. The short answer, of course, is that we didn't know.

...AND FINALLY

THE English football captain who was born in Singapore (Backtrack, May 27) was Terry Butcher.

Today back to cricket, and John Phelan in Howden-le- Wear invites the identity of the only husband and wife both to have played the game at international level.

Sauce for the goose, the column returns on Tuesday.