Fastest bowler in series has been let down by bad luck and worse batting, but should still be savoured
Good news has been in short supply for England’s cricketers during this Ashes series but some arrived for Mark Wood in the shape of the new year honours list: his father was awarded an OBE for services to pensioners for his work at the Department for Work and Pensions in the north-east.
Derek Wood was also among the first to sample his son’s speeds in the back garden at home in Ashington. “We had to stop when I was about 13,” the younger Wood told me six years ago, shortly after winning his first Test call-up. “We had a long thin garden and I’d charge in from the conifers at the back. I kept hitting him on the head.”
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