Cricket News

What a ''marvelous'' day, 77 not not, and what a great innings to date. Richie Benaud was a world-class Test cricket all-rounder, blending cunning leg spin bowling with lower order batting aggression. Furthermore, since his retirement from international cricket in 1964, he has become one of the most highly regarded commentators of all time.

Where would cricket commentary be without the phrases ''Got 'im!" and "That's stumps.... Sadly, the 2005 Ashes series was the last that Benaud commentated on in Britain.

His final commentary came near the end of the final day of the Fifth Test at the Oval. Luckily for those down under, Richie has continued to commentate on the Nine Network. Happy birthday Richie and make sure you have an ''absolute cracker''.

In the real world, it wasn’t such a great day in 1981 for Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, who was gunned down with a host of other diplomats and dignitaries by machine gun-toting assassins, sparking US pres Ronnie Reagan to claim that mankind had “lost a champion of peace.” Nor was it such a hot day for hippies, for on this day in 1966 the US government made LSD an illegal drug. The trippy thing is a lot of people still ignore this law.

So it’s Joyeux Anniversaire!, as they say in Gay Paree, to dishy Swedish Bond girl Britt Ekland (65); West Indies-baiting South Africa-born former England cricket skipper Tony Greig (62); Middlesbrough’s Aussie ‘keeper Mark Schwarzer (36); hunky period-role Welsh actor Ioan Gruffudd (35); It also would have been the 30th birthday of dashing Frenchy fighter pilot Roland Garros, had he not been shot down in flames over Vouziers, Ardennes the day before.