He has quickly discovered how ephemeral glory is. The two catches he took at short leg on Saturday turned him into a media headliner. The difficult chance he spilled yesterday at fine leg off Jonty Rhodes could have cost England the Test.

The flaxen-haired Spendlove, 19, who only made his first-class debut last year, was called down to Edgbaston - where he collects £60 a day plus allowances for his work - on the recommendation of his Derbyshire colleague Dominic Cork who told England coach David Lloyd: ``He's a very fine fielder with great hands.''

Spendlove said he had enjoyed ``the best two days of his life'' and was sanguine about the Rhodes miss which helped South Africa to save the follow-on.

``I couldn't seen the ball out of the crowd but then I saw it against the sky. I saw it all the way, got my hands to it and thought I had it, but then it just bobbed out. I was really disappointed but the other players told me what a good effort I'd made.''

England's Test history is littered with great catches - and misses by substitutes. Probably the most astonishing was that taken by Sydney Copley, a 24-year-old on the Trent Bridge groundstaff, when he dismissed Australia's Stan McCabe in 1930. Copley was substituting for Harold Larwood and fielding at mid-on, according to Wisden, he ``made a lot of ground, took the ball at full length and although rolling over, retained possession.''

The catch ended a potentially match-winning stand between McCabe and Don Bradman and England won by 93 runs. A week later Copley made his Nottinghamshire debut - but never played again.

In 1982 the then Kent batsman Neil Taylor held an outstanding catch at fine leg at the Oval to dismiss Indian batsman Sandip Patil off Ian Botham. Two years later Don Topley, later of Essex and then on MCC's groundstaff, caught Malcolm Marshall hooking Bob Willis but carried the ball over the rope and into the Lord's crowd.

In 1989 Robin Sims, another on the groundstaff, caught Australian captain Allan Border for one at long leg in the Ashes Test and the following summer Chris Adams - now the Sussex captain - took two catches fielding as substitute in the England-India Test at Old Trafford.