IT'S the second week of the libel case that has brought Mrs Dawes of Swanley, Kent to London's High Court to witness a parade of celebrities Hello! magazine would be proud of as Imran Khan (cricketer, socialite and would be politician) and Ian Botham (cricketer, tv personality and would be good bloke) face each other across the blue carpet of Court 13, flanked by their respective teams of spouses, family and friends.
On a purely physical level, the protagonists are a good deal closer than the 22 yards that separated them in the past, bat against ball, but in every other respect, as far apart as it is possible to be without declaring war.
"You can see the breeding," says the lady from Kent, as Imran Kahn's wife and mother in law sweep high nosed into the waiting car. "You can see it in the bones and the skin. Jemima never wears any make up, not like Kathy."
I am about to point out that Kathy Botham is 20 years older than Jemima Imran (42 to 22) when the waiting photographers leap into action as a posse of dark suited men sweep down the steps of London's High Court of Justice, pursued by clerks pushing trolleys loaded with paperwork. At the centre of the maelstrom, the shiny red hair of Kathy Botham can just be seen bobbing along in the current.
On Wednesday, the day before England walked out on the hallowed turf of Lords to face Pakistan in the first Test, captain Mike Atherton and coach David Lloyd were in court giving judge and jury the benefit of their views on hall tampering, the business of raising the stitched seam which joins the two halves of red leather. But this time they were playing for the other side or rather, for Imran Khan, former captain of the Pakistan national team.
Not that they did so willingly. They had been subpoened and Atherton (Cambridge) was wearing his England tic just in case there should be any misunderstanding.
Misunderstanding is what this case is all about. Or so says Khan, who claims he never called Ian Botham a cheat (for ball tampering) or described Botham and fellow England cricketer Allan Lamb as "racist, uneducated, lacking in class and up bringing", quotes attributed to him in the Sun and India Today newspapers respectively and for which he is now being sued for libel in the case described by the tabloids as "the toff versus the barrow boy".
It could only happen in England where the saying it's not cricket" was invented meaning that although no rules may actually have been broken, a nebulous code of fair play has been sullied.
In this most class ridden of societies, sport is the last stronghold of class division. Rugby union is still regarded as the game for chaps soccer for louts. In the north the working class who wanted to play rugby (and to be paid for doing so) had to invent their own game, rugby league.
But cricket supported both elements within its boundaries. After all, chaps staying at the manor, enjoying what we would now vulgarly call "the weekend", had to have somebody to play against and who better than the game keeper, scullery boy and assorted yeomanry?
On the pitch, all was egalitarian but that's where it ended. The distinction of Gentlemen and Players persisted right up until 1962. Until then, players were paid wages, gentlemen expenses each had their own changing rooms. At Lords there were even separate entrance gates.
The sport of libel, however, has always been an upper class diversion. It's about the destruction of reputation and only the aristocracy had reputations that mattered. Apart from murder, they rarely went to court for anything else.
Imran Khan may be foreign, but being Oxford educated, married to the daughter of multi millionaire Sir James Goldsmith and confidante to Princess Diana, makes him the very model of a modern English gentleman.
IAN Botham may have been educated at a secondary modern but he votes Tory, is a staunch monarchist and sits on a committee of British cricket's governing body, the MCC. Make no doubt about it, these sportsmen, acknowledged stars in their firmament, are the aristocracy of the late 20th century.
Cricket is one of the few games which regularly ends in a draw, but Botham v Khan offers no such campromise. Late on Thursday the court was stunned when Khan announced he was prepared to accept Botham was not tampering with the ball and that in video footage shown to the jury Botham was, as claimed, just "moulding the ball" back into shape. Imran Khan has offered a public apology. As for the other libel, however, the attack on Botham's class may not be so easy to explain away. Khan has made it clear he will not apologise for something he says he never said. All will depend on who the jury believes.
Earlier in the week an emotional Kathy Botham told the crowded courtroom that she had "gone through hell", and spoke of her fears for the health of her youngest daughter. "I have no idea what it has all got to do with ball tampering, racism, coming from a low class or whatever this trial is meant to be about."
Allan Lamb's wife Lyndsey was in tears. It was the second time her husband had been in court the first was against the former Pakistani fast bowler Sarfraz Nawaz. "This is the 11th day I have had to spend listening to ball tampering we had four days with Sarfraz and seven days now just listening to balls," she said. And the court laughed. We knew what she meant.