Yesterday I was at Trent College near Nottingham to give a talk to pupils on Great Negotiations of Our Time, namely:

  • The Individual v The Collective
  • Knowledge v Belief
  • Today v Tomorrow

By way of elucidation for their educational edification I managed to squeeze in Mr Incredible, the Joker, Clint Eastwood and, of course, Shrek. But in the excitement I forgot the joke about the Pole, the Nigerian and the Russian whose wives have just had babies who get muddled up in the hospital ward. Sigh. Next time.

After my talk the Head of the school Gill Dixon with some colleagues and pupils kindly hosted me in the impressive new dining hall and pavilion named after Prince Alexander Obolensky.

Obolensky was a White Russian whose family fled the Communists and came to the UK. He ended up at Trent College and went on from there to Oxford and fame as an outstandingly fleet rugby player representing England.

His finest hour was at Twickenham in 1936, when England beat the New Zealand All Blacks, in good part thanks to two Obolensky tries. Despite the fact that Obolensky had not completed all the formalities needed for British citizenship, he was qualified in the only sense that mattered in those carefree days:

Obolensky was still awaitng naturalization as a British citizen when he was chosen for England. This led to a memorable exchange with the guest of honour, the Prince of Wales – very shortly to become Edward VIII and enjoy a reign little longer than Obolensky’s international career.

Introduced to the newcomer, the Prince asked ‘By what right do you presume to play for England?’. Not the slightest discomposed, Obolensky responded with icy hauteur ‘I attend Oxford University… sir’.. 

Obolensky died in 1940 in a freak training accident when his Hurricane hit a rabbit warren; he crashed from the aircraft because he was not using his safety-harness as it obscured visibility.

Here is one of the immortal Obolensky tries at Twickenham which shows just how fast a runner he was – and the no less immortal accent of the commentator describing it.