NANCY DOYLE MBE CRICKET MEMORABILA
Tuesday, 20 October - Tuesday, 3 November 2026

THE NANCY DOYLE MBE ESTATE COLLECTION. Known as Nancy, she was the catering manager at Lord's Cricket Ground who served the players’ dining room for more than 35 years up to her retirement in 1996. She was awarded her honorary MBE in 1994 for her long service as the catering manager at Lord's Cricket Ground. As a sign of appreciation Nancy was bestowed with a superb collection of 178 lots of memorabilia of the day (1970's to 1990's) including: signed/autographed: bats, programmes, Player Lists, souvenirs, photographs, booklets, scorebook, books and assorted ephemera. This collection for auction represents nearly her entire collection. The fiercest bouncer received by Mike Brearley was not from Michael Holding, Dennis Lillee, Imran Khan or any of the whizzbangs who prowled cricket three or four decades ago. Instead, it was sent down with blistering verbal venom by someone who was 5ft when on tiptoe, fiery, female and very Irish. Nancy Doyle ran the players' dining room at Lord's with an iron fist. She fed her boys well, too well in fact, Brearley felt, and took it on himself to suggest as much. It sent Nancy's reactor to critical. "Tell you what, Michael," she spat, drawing herself up and stabbing her forefinger into his chest, like a woodpecker at a tree, "I won't tell you how to fecking bat if you don't tell me how to fecking cook. OK?" We heard no more about it and there was not one person in the Middlesex dressing room sorry about that. Nancy ran what was generally regarded as not just the best kitchen on the county circuit but the best in international cricket. Her lunches carried with them legendary status, so that bowlers prayed for a batting day so they could do them justice. Three, four, sometimes five courses were brought out: soup, starter, main, pudding and cheeseboard. Just occasionally, during bad weather that precluded play in the immediate future, there might be a bottle or two of the MCC claret sneaked on to the table as well. It was a world away from the slimy ham salad at the other end of the catering scale and, in no small way, helped make Mike Gatting the man he is today.