The perils of wearing a cricket helmet.

or

A good excuse to write dislodged lots

Today England beat the West Indies in the Old Trafford test match. The oddity of the match was Kevin Pietersen being out, "Hit Wicket", due to his helmet being dislodged by Dwayne Bravo.

This wouldn't have happened 25 years ago, as players then played without helmets, despite the rather hard ball being aimed at their heads often enough. Here is Ian Botham showing how to do this successfully and without bothering to look at the ball, and here is Brian Close facing a much more dangerous West Indian fast bowling attack than the current one with a lack of protection.

When I started this post, I thought that this danger started with helmets, but having read the wikipedia article for hit wicket above, apparently the weight of a cap is enough to dislodge a bail, and caps can be removed from heads by either the ball or the wind. Several such incidents are recalled here anecdotally, including one of being out "hit wicket" via a dislodged toupee.