INSPIRED by the Ashes showdown, Sir John Major reveals his hidden talent for poetry in The Times today.

The former Prime Minister has kept his musings on his love for the game, and his disdain for some of his parliamentary colleagues, a closely guarded secret until now.

Sir John, who sought the sanctuary of the Oval cricket ground on the day he left Downing Street after his crushing general election defeat in 1997, may yet be moved to verse again over the crucial last Test, which begins tomorrow.

Writing in today’s special Ashes supplement Sir John, an MCC committee member, describes how he honed his writing skills to relieve the monotony of life in the Commons, but he refuses to divulge his poetic observations of friends and foe in Parliament.

Describing his time as a junior government whip more than 20 years ago, he said: “I passed the time writing brief poetic sketches of the parliamentary characters of the day (best not published in their, or my, lifetime).”

Politics has not been blessed with many poets among its ranks. Clement Attlee, the postwar Labour Prime Minister, was known to scribble a few ditties, and Mary Wilson, the widow of the late Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson, published a book of poems during her time in Downing Street.

Sir John insists, however, that no amount of money from publishers would persuade him to go public. He does, however, share one example he crafted while trapped on the front bench during a Test match.

“I scribbled A Cricket Prayer, a fragment of which I still recall:

“Oh, Lord, if I must die today,
Please make it after close of play.
For this I know, if nothing more,
I will not go, without the score.”

Sir John acknowledges that he is no threat to Andrew Motion, the Poet Laureate. “Hardly Wordsworth, I know,” he says. “But it is a sentiment that many will share over the next five days. On the field will be some of the greatest talents in world cricket of whom, one day, old men, now small boys, will babble in awe.

"This Ashes series has been the stuff of legend. Drama has been commonplace and, in at least two cricketloving nations, many millions will focus on this final game. As for me — oh, lucky me — I’m off to the Oval.”

Privilege has its perks. As England’s most celebrated supporter Sir John will be able to watch the match from the comfort of the VIP enclosure. He is the president of Surrey Cricket Club whose home ground is the Oval in South London.

This will in part make up for one of the greatest disappointments of his life. As a ten-year-old boy in Brixton, a Flintoff-six-hit from the Oval, he was distraught when he could not get a ticket for England’s final Ashes Test in 1953, which, if you are looking for omens, they won by eight wickets.

“I heard a tout had some for sale, and rushed up to him eagerly, money clutched tightly in hand, but he looked at me with scorn and named a premium far beyond my means. With wet eyes, I withdrew and had to settle with disappointment for the radio instead.” Sir John says that as a boy the Oval was always his first destination during the long summer holiday. As it will be tomorrow.

www.timesonline.co.uk/ashes
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