On June 4, 1993, not long before tea on the second day of the Ashes curtain-raiser at Old Trafford, the cricketing world’s collective jaw was lowered when a young blonde leg-spinner from Melbourne’s first delivery in Ashes cricket fizzed, curved and then ripped along such an improbable flight path that England’s best player of spin, Mike Gatting, had to seek confirmation from the umpire that the ball that he’d seen (or not seen) rag past the outside edge of his bat, had in fact hit the stumps. It was soon anointed the ‘Ball of the Century’, and much like the film of the Twin Towers collapsing on 9/11 or JFK’s assassination, no-one who saw it live will forget where they were when it happened. Cricket would never be the same again.

Just two short years earlier, however, and only 30 miles up the road, the same SK Warne was being booed from the field after his home debut for Accrington in the Lancashire League. “Send ‘im back!” bellowed one or two members. “Go ‘ome, pro” foghorned a few more. Tough crowd! (But then, previous pros had included Wes Hall, Eddie Barlow and Bobby Simpson, while Graeme ‘Foxy’ Fowler and David ‘Bumble’ Lloyd were homegrown stars.)

Warne had just had his off stump sent cartwheeling, first ball, by Ramsbottom’s Steve ‘Dasher’ Dearden (father of Leicestershire’s Harry), this after an earlier spell of 16-1-82-2 during which Jack Simpson (father of Middlesex’s Jonny) had swept him to distraction. “The very first ball he bowled at me pitched outside leg stump,” Simpson recalls, “and I was looking to help it on its way, but I absolutely nailed it and it went for four. He came down the wicket, saying: ‘What’s your f****** game, sweeping leg-spin?’ I said: ‘If you keep bowling there, I’ll keep sweeping you’.”

These issues notwithstanding, Warne duly followed his six-for at Rishton with 5-35 against Ramsbottom, for whom Jack Simpson once again made a half-century to become one of only two amateur players to get twin fifties against Warne that summer. The other was Nelson’s Ian Clarkson, an insurance salesman who scored 69 and 50, both not out, ably assisted by yet another Aussie pro, Joe Scuderi, who made 121 and 52, also both unbeaten.

Clarkson admits he couldn’t pick him: “Joe told me I’d spot the googly because he drops his arm. His first googly, I never saw it. It was like a snake. But if he tossed it up I couldn’t resist. We became quite friendly and he got us tickets for Old Trafford, the day he bowled the Gatting ball.”

Warne’s combined figures for the two Nelson games were a less than flash 20-0-119-0, but one quality he could never be said to lack was self-belief, and so the game after being marmalised to the tune of 14-0-87-0 he somehow managed to talk his way into opening the batting – and this at a point in the season when he had just 77 league runs at 8.55. He duly chipped in with 39 in Accrington’s victory over Enfield, one of just two league wins before August, and a few weeks later made his solitary half-century, against eventual champions Haslingden. He finished with 329 runs at 14.95.

Accrington would only win two more games before Warne’s early departure for an Australia A tour of Zimbabwe, both against bottom side Colne, and ended up just one spot above the wooden spoon, having come fourth and second the previous two years. Barker felt this was less a reflection of Warne’s contribution – 73 wickets at 15.43 and sixth in the wicket charts despite missing the last three games – more “a squad in transition”, and he was unequivocal when consulted about retaining the leggie for the following season. “I said he’d benefit enormously from having a year under his belt and that he’d play for Australia within twelve months, and people in the committee room laughed at me.”

As it transpired, Warne wouldn’t have been available. On the second day of the following year, four months and a day after his Accrington farewell, he made a Test debut at the SCG and after that… well, it’s rumoured to have gone fairly well for him.