Things like this are not supposed to happen any more. Not in this regimented era of central contracts, national academies, selectorial continuity and all the other trappings of Team England. But we entered a thoroughly Yorkshire time warp yesterday, recalling those innocent days of whistling down a mineshaft to find a fast bowler.

That, at least, was how it felt at 10am on a typically grey Headingley day, as Michael Vaughan peeled away from a prolonged management brain-storming and offered a congratulatory handshake to a man who, until recently, made his living as a roof tiler. It was the second time in successive days he had shaken the hand of Darren Pattinson. The first time was to introduce himself, Vaughan having little more knowledge of this wild-card pick – or even what he looked like – than the vast majority of yesterday’s perplexed crowd.

In the minutes that followed, Pattinson may have wondered how to tell his family he could not, after all, take them on the planned outing to Alton Towers. By way of a variation on the rollercoaster theme, he was taking the new ball against South Africa straight after tea. But it was at this point, after England had been dismissed in two sessions of a day pockmarked by controversy, that any resemblance to the heroic deeds of Wilson of the Wizard began to seem fanciful.

First impressions can be unfair as well as dangerous, but Pattinson, starting only his twelfth first-class game when a fortnight short of 30, did not look a bowler to strike fear into South African hearts. Romantics will hope that he revises such judgments on what may be the pivotal day of this series, but plenty more, while holding nothing personal against a guy with the sort of cheesy grin and gelled quiff that sponsors could be queuing up to endorse, view his dramatic elevation less charitably.

This was either an admirably adventurous piece of selection or a crass overreaction to a man who has played a handful of games for Nottinghamshire – a man, more pertinently to some, whose eligibility comes through birthright, but definitely not through upbringing, accent or maybe even inclination.

Pattinson was born in Grimsby, which makes him unique among Test cricketers. But he was living in Australia by the age of 5 and that is where he has stayed, bar the odd summer excursion to play for such unsung Yorkshire clubs as Follifoot and Townville. Home is Narre Warren South, in the Dandenong Ranges of Victoria, for whom he made his state debut only in January last year.

Even his father, John, says: “He’s Australian, Darren is. He just wanted a chance to play [international cricket].” Whether that chance should have been extended at the expense of any number of homegrown prospects – let alone the ever dependable but evidently discarded Matthew Hoggard – is exercising many minds.

Graham Gooch, here as a commentator and still a fiercely proud patriot, said that it was a selection that could “devalue the international game”, adding: “Representing England is more than just cricket, more than just a pay-packet.” That had the internet forums buzzing with polarised reactions.

Gooch was England’s captain when one-off selections frequently smacked of the desperation of a losing side. Remember Joey Benjamin’s single Test in 1994? Or Neil Mallender, fourth umpire here yesterday, being plucked from the ranks of county journeymen for his debut two years earlier? There was a still closer comparison in Martin McCague. Like Pattinson, he had grown up in Australia and spoke like an Australian. When he was picked during the Ashes series of 1993, Australian newspapers labelled him “the rat joining a sinking ship”.

Similar scorn from across the world greeted yesterday’s news. A headline in the Brisbane Times sneered “Poms claim another Aussie”, the story starting: “The poms are at it again. Hot on the heels of claiming Australian-born Wimbledon winner Laura Robson as one of their own . . . ”

It might, of course, have been no more than a cunning plot. For the one thing that Pattinson undeniably achieved on his debut day was to distract everyone from the fanfared return of Andrew Flintoff. After an impatient innings, Flintoff settled back into bowling and fielding as if he had never been away. In truth, he had been away from the Test team longer than the full span of Pattinson’s first-class career.

Coming in from the cold

Other players to have come seemingly from nowhere to play for England

Douglas Carr
He was a modest club player for Maidstone and had been a medium-pace bowler for Oxford University, but not in any first-class matches. In 1908, aged 36, he started to experiment with the googly and became so proficient that Kent offered him a trial. He was given his only England cap in 1909, against Australia at the Oval, and took seven wickets.

Charles Marriott
He was another googly bowler who taught at Dulwich College, playing for Kent in the summer holidays. He played only one Test, also at the Oval, at the age of 38 against West Indies in 1933, taking 11 for 96 as England won by an innings.

Tony Pigott
A Sussex fast-medium bowler, he was playing for Wellington in 1984 when injury-stricken England called him up for the second Test against New Zealand in Christchurch. It meant that he had to postpone his wedding. He took two wickets but England were twice bowled out for fewer than 100. Words by Patrick Kidd

The game within

Richard Hobson analyses the first day’s play at Headingley Carnegie

Smith on cloud nine
Once bitten, twice fine. Having put in England at Lord’s and watched them score 593 for eight declared from his vantage point at slip, Graeme Smith, above, must have thought twice before repeating the decision to bowl yesterday – especially because the home team’s attack had spent the last three days of the first Test in the field. But there is an adage for captains at Headingley: “Look up, not down.” Smith did just that - saw the low, grey clouds and decided to bowl again.

He cannot have dared hope, though, that those clouds would part almost as he walked out with Neil McKenzie to begin the reply. A case of fortune favouring the brave and, as if to confirm Smith’s wisdom, Michael Vaughan, who knows the ground better than most, said after the toss that he, too, would have bowled first.

Dangerous driving
Four England batsmen from Kevin Pietersen onwards perished driving during the calamitous afternoon session for the home team. Call it poor shot selection, but it also confirmed that the South Africa bowlers learnt the lessons from Lord’s that they cannot pitch too short. This time, against a fuller length from Morne Morkel and Dale Steyn, the England batsmen reached for the ball in front of their bodies instead of playing late.

Trial and error
Would the day have panned out differently had the teams agreed to trial a referral system? The idea runs that each team can send three on-field decisions per innings to the third umpire for reassessment with the aid of television replays. Had Alastair Cook, above, England’s first wicket, been allowed to query his dismissal, caught via thigh and not bat, Billy Bowden’s judgment would have been overturned. The trial will take place instead during the series between Sri Lanka and India that starts on Wednesday.

Worst fears realised
South Africa were right to fear Andrew Flintoff the bowler rather than Flintoff the batsman. Mickey Arthur, the touring team’s coach, said that left-handed batsmen had prepared particularly for the steepling bounce he gets from around the wicket – exactly the kind of ball, in fact, that Flintoff produced to get rid of Smith.