Dirty little secret

The news that professionals quite often use bats made by people other than the manufacturer they are sponsored by will come as no surprise, but today is the first time I've seen it openly acknowledged.

Millichamp & Hall's Christmas newsletter arrived this morning [boys, it's still November...] and they included a nice farewell to Justin Langer [M&H's workshop is within the county ground at Taunton]. With it was a picture of 'one of the bats made for him by Rob, which he presented on his departure from Somerset'.

Sure enough, the bat made by M&H is stickered up as a Kookaburra. You have to feel for the batmaker, in his ghostwriter's role...