‘Acceptance of mediocrity’: Middlesex gaze south enviously with golden years long gone

With their last title a decade ago, young players moving on and coach churn, Middlesex are no longer even the most famous team that call Lord’s homeMiddlesex is unlike every other English county in at least one very important way. It doesn’t actually exist. It was abolished by the London Government Act of 1963, persisted, in dotage, as a postal subdivision, until Royal Mail put it to sleep in 1996. Today, you’ll find it on the tiles of Swiss Cottage Tube station – which are embossed with its bad...