Posted by Daisy writes…
King Cricket commissioned me to analyse the crowd at the recent women’s Test match at Lord’s.
The null hypothesis: that the proportion of the crowd who are knobheads is the same at women’s Test matches and men’s Test matches.
The alternative hypothesis: that proportionally far fewer knobheads attend a women’s Test match than a men’s Test match.
KC requested anthropological research with hard facts and statistics.
“Good luck with that,” said Ged.
Our previous experience of women’s Test cricket was at Shenley in August 2003, when there was no crowd to speak of, apart from ourselves. Knobhead percentage 0.000000%.
Lord’s in July 2026, with around 10,000 in the crowd, would be a different matter altogether.
I decided to work mostly with pictures, taking advantage of our elevated status as member and member’s guest to visit several parts of the ground.
First up, death row on the pavilion terrace, where I interviewed our friend, Jim Dixon.
Jim felt that knobheads in Lord’s terms comprise parvenues and arrivistes, not just the Champagne Charlies of my worst nightmares.
“Are there parvenues and arrivistes on display today,” I asked.
“Just one or two. No names, no pack-drill,” said Jim in a quasi-colonial, quasi-military tone.
I couldn’t quite tell whether Jim was joking or serious. Quintessentially Jim.
Onwards and upwards to the pavilion sun deck.
There Ged took some more pictures and ran into friends Sid and Claire.
I observed just one example of a further category; a ‘red-faced slaphead,’ angrily berating some youngsters for moving around inappropriately during play.
But the pavilion on a ‘relaxed dress code and young visitors allowed’ day is not an ideal comparator.
Ged and I retired to the Warner Stand. It was sparsely populated – almost completely devoid of the Champagne Charlies who normally hang out there for major matches.
We spotted some ECB officials near the boundary boards, who were presumably churning some data for a similar research programme.
We observed the joyous family-friendly atmosphere in the Grandstand. It looked almost totally knobhead-free from our viewpoint.
Ged asked me to show him a knobhead face for the pictorial element of the research paper.
We then both sported Ged’s latest wheeze – the closest garment he can find to the traditional MCC pillbox hat, which was all the rage in the 1850s and 1860s.
This failed to attract a swarm of people to observe, so we decided to go home.
In numbers, Ged informs me that the results are crystal clear.
Knobhead percentage at men’s Test matches: 0.006267 (just under two thirds of one per cent). N=30,000. Knobhead percentage at women’s Test matches: 0.001239 (just under one eighth of one per cent). N =10,000. We can be 99.99999993% confident that there are proportionally fewer knobheads at women’s Test matches than at men’s ones. QED.
Magnificently thorough research, Daisy – thank you for that.
But Ged – how on earth did you arrive at that knobhead percentage figure for men’s Test matches?
We have attended any number of men’s Test matches, including multiple at Lord’s. Even on the least knobheady day, the knobhead volume would have been massively in excess of what you state. Throw in a few Saturdays at Ashes Tests and the percentage can only go up enormously.
We can only assume our knobhead identification threshold is significantly lower than yours.
Many thanks for your kind words, KC. Daisy is delighted with the look of the piece and with the unprecedented speed of its uploading.
My website has just had a pingback from a Brazilian site that has syndicated Daisy’s piece, no doubt to the delight of sports fans in Brazil who are probably thinking of nothing other than women’s cricket at the moment. The late Dowager Duchess of Castlebar would have been thrilled to see Daisy’s words in Portuguese, as The Duchess was fluent in that language, along with several others.
https://www.segundabase.com.br/noticias/analise-de-crowd-knobhead-para-a-partida-de-teste-feminina-inglaterra-x-india-no-lords/351960/
It seems that the Portuguese word for knobhead is “knobhead”, which I think is important for all KC readers to know.
As for my numerical and statistical analysis, I believe my quantitative methods are above and beyond reproach, KC. If you have empirical evidence, other than your subjective sense that, on men’s test match days, “knobheads are all around” – bring on that evidence I say. I am open-minded in the face of hard facts.
Surely, though, where you (or rather Daisy) give figures for “knobhead percentage” you actually mean “quotient” or similar, because the figure you give is expressed as a fraction of 1 rather than 100?
Still seems very low mind. Meanwhile congratulations on having defeated the AI translator bots with ‘knobhead’!
I like your socks Ged!
Quotient indeed, Tim. A term with which Daisy was unfamiliar. I therefore chose to express the statistic as both a quotient and a percentage. I apologise for any confusion that might have resulted.
As for my socks, JB, thanks for the praise. They have a strong nod to MCC colours with some additional colours, and without the exact branding banding, as it were. It is the sock wearing equivalent of an Eric Morecombe piano playing episode: the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order. The same might be said for the pillbox cap.