A favourite joke

One of my favourite jokes about Melbourne is about what the name of the next new Melbourne suburb should be.

I always say it should be called Wass, because one of the major outer suburban growth areas is called Hallam.

The names Hallam and Wass may not seem related to most people, but to old county cricket buffs like myself they are intimately related because of Nottinghamshire’s 1907 County Championship record of fifteen wins and four draws from nineteen games due to their amazingly effective bowling on sticky wicket after sticky wicket in England’s coolest summer of the twentieth century, taking 298 wickets for 12.66 runs apiece. Hallam’s flighty off-spin and Wass’ deadly fast leg cutter popped and spun in a manner even batsmen with better technique than today’s spoiled cricketers could not counter.

I know this is a joke because Albert Hallam, who did not play for England even in the Tests of 1907, cannot be the person for whom the Hallam in Victoria is named after, but it is just too funny and is a story probably few people even in England know!