| HistoryText | - Henry Nobbins was a labourer on a building site until a solicitor named Wimpole tracked him down and informed him that he was actually the hereditary Earl of Ranworth and had inherited a castle full of servants and five million pounds . The catch was that until fairly recently, the Earls of Ranworth had all been notable sportsmen, and the outgoing Earl had decreed in his will that before he could touch the money, Lord Henry would first have to redeem the family's reputation by achieving all the sporting miracles which his immediate predecessors had failed to accomplish, including scoring a goal in a Cup Final, winning the Grand Prix, the boat race and a Marathon, riding in the Grand National, scoring a Century at Lords, becoming a Middleweight boxing champion, and scoring a try in the Rugby League Cup Final. Henry, who had never been notably sporty, was aghast to learn that if he failed to achieve his goals, not only would he forfeit the Earldom and the five million quid, but the servants of Castle Plonkton would all be sacked and the castle sold and turned into a glue factory by the nefarious Mr.Parkinson and his henchman, Fred Bloggs. So, no pressure there, then.
Fortunately, Henry proved to have unsuspected sporting talents, and if he wasn't the sharpest tool in the box, his butler Jarvis certainly made up for his deficiencies in cunning. And the fact that the Earl of Ranworth was coincidentally the owner and chairman of Mertown Rovers Football Club got His Sporting Lordship off to a fairly good start, as well...
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