Sport Today

I just read a book about the 1966 West Indies tour of England, by John
Clarke and Brian Scovell. Clarke was the Evening Standard's cricket
correspondent and was commissioned to do the book on his own, but he
died rather inconveniently during the series and Scovell was drafted
in to complete it.

A bit of context may be helpful. MJK Smith, who had captained the team
to a 1-0 victory in SA the previous winter, was captain for the First
Test, which West Indies won by an innings. Colin Cowdrey took over for
the next three Tests, most of which he lost, and then Brian Close was
summoned for the dead *** match which England won in the same sort
of tone of renewed optimism as we saw at The Oval this summer. In all
25 players were selected, the only one to play in all five being,
amazingly, Ken Higgs. Tom Graveney was a surprising recall at the age
of 39, having last played for England on the 62-63 Ashes tour, but a
number of new players were also tried: Colin Milburn, Basil
d'Oliveira, Derek Underwood and Dennis Amiss.

Scovell was obviously the only one who could make the end-of-tour
comments, which I shall now quote extensively as an interesting
snapshot of where England were in September 1966, at least in one
reporter's view. I shall also take the liberty of presenting it as a
continuous piece of prose, though I am actually leaving out clauses
and sentences which are repetitious or wander down avenues of little
relevance.

###

The backbone of the England batting was 39-year-old Tom Graveney,
whose 459 runs at 76.50 apiece put him way out in front of the England
averages. Graveney is turning out to be a latter-day Hobbs, getting
better as he grows older. He says himself that he has never batted
batter in his career than he has this season. He is by nature an
aggressive batsman and this series must have quashed forever the
belief that his temperament is suspect.

England's second most successful batsman - and he was dropped for his
pains - was Colin Milburn with 316 runs at 52.66. If Milburn continues
to score runs at his present rate next season he will have to come
back to the Test arena, irrespective of whether he has lost weight.

Behind these two as England's top hits came the South-African-born
Basil d'Oliveira, whose powerful shots lit up some of the gloomier
days of the series. His bowling was also of inestimable value to
England and I can see him playing in the England side for years to
come.

Cowdrey's batting was a disappointment. Except for his 96 at Trent
Bridge, he failed to play a commanding innings. Boycott, too, failed
to provide the goods and if another grafting opener matures in the
next year or so Boycott's place must be in danger unless he eliminates
his weakness on and around the off stump.

Amiss is a promising newcomer but needs more experience before he can
be spoken of as a successor to Cowdrey and Barrington. Eric Russell
did not appear to have a straight enough bat to come back as an
opening batsman and we could well see Amiss moving up to this position
in a future series.

England's main weakness was in the fast bowling department. Higgs was
straight and used the ball well but he is not a speed merchant. He
doesn't terrify anyone. Snow was so badly thought of that he was
originally dropped for The Oval Test. Well as he bowled, he has a
long, long way to go before he can be considered a natural successor
to Trueman. Snow is a wholehearted cricketer, but appears to be just a
shade too slow to make the breakthrough by pace alone.

Barry Knight, like Derek Underwood, the left-arm economy bowler,
showed himself to be short of Test class. Good county cricketers, both
of them, but lacking in the highest grade. Underwood may come again,
but he will have to learn to spin the ball first. The off-spin
department was a letdown. Titmus, with five wickets at 38 apiece, was
the most successful of the three tried but he is over the hill now.
Allen played only at Old Trafford, disappointing on a pitch which
should have suited him, and Illingworth owed his part in the victory
celebrations at The Oval more to the recommendation of his county
captain than to his own efforts on the field. Still, he is a spirited
cricketer and this was something that as lacking from some of the
bigger names when the pressure was really on earlier in the series.  

###

Forty years on, now that we know how their careers turned out, some of
the comments on the newbies seem really weird - but they serve as a
great reminder that it's often much too early to write people off or
suggest that they have little future. Even "over the hill" Titmus's
playing career did not finish for another 15 years.

Cheers,

Mike
--

I bought that book at the time, and it's still on my shelves somewhere.

<snip>

The ones that Scovell got very obviously wrong were Snow (but he was far
from alone, as it wasn't at all obvious how much Snow would improve over
the next year or two) and - perhaps more culpably - Underwood, where he
doesn't seem to have understood what sort of bowler he was.

It's odd that he doesn't mention Parks, who kept wicket in the first
four Tests, Barrington and Edrich, even though the latter two were
temporarily out of favour or injured and only played in two mtaches and
one match respectively. Or Barber, for that matter, who had been a great
success in Australia in 1965-6.

He was very much on the mark in most of his other comments IMO, though.
--
John Hall
          "If you haven't got anything nice to say about anybody, come
           sit next to me."
                                 Alice Roosevelt Longworth (1884-1980)

On Sun, 12 Oct 2008 18:30:19 +0100, John Hall

I'd prefer to assume that he got them right for summer 1966 and
thereby be able to note how they later developed and blossomed.

I admit I hadn't realised that Snow had started as not a very fast
bowler and then put on a yard or two. It's almost as surprising as
learning that Boycs had an obvious weakness in his early days.

So what sort of a bowler was Underwood in 1966? By the descriptions
Scovell gives of his bowling during the matches, he presented as a
slow-medium bowler who did not spin the ball very much, if at all, and
the Windies found him pretty easy to play. However subtle he may have
become in later years, he was still a relatively new bowler in county
cricket and a complete novice at Test level.

On Parks he made the substantive comment that he was disappointing and
rightly replaced by Murray. I didn't bother to transcribe the comments
on Barber and Barrington because they reflected them playing little
part in the series and being obviously injured or out of form when
they did.

Cheers,

Mike
--

The first cricket book I ever read was "King Cricket" by Gary Sobers
and it was about this tour -- neighbor of mine (who had played some
first class cricket) had the book and upon learning that I played
cricket but didn't know who Sobers was, handed the book to me to
read.  This was over 35 years ago, and as a kid who hadn't yet turned
10 (or were just about there), it made a huge impression on me, and
I'm convinced was one of they factors that started my life-long
obsession with this great game.  I had no idea who Sobers was (before
I read this book), and I remember quite a few things from the book.

Sobers has a lot of praise for Tom Graveney -- I remember him praising
Graveney for walking in a county game when Sobers took a sharp catch
("Did you catch it Gary?" "yes Tom") and then being full of praise for
his great batting.  Sobers loved Milburn as well, and rejoiced in his
calypso attitude to cricket.  Other things I recall is his description
of a long stand with his own cousin to win a Test that seemed lost.
Finally, I remember him getting out for duck in the final innings of
the series trying to hook a John Snow bouncer.

Lovely book

Bharat

On Mon, 13 Oct 2008 01:14:05 +1000, Mike Holmans  

[snip]

*The* Ken Higgs, or the one who played for England?

--

cheers,
calvin

Will we be having this same conversation in 40 years about Cameron White?

--

cheers,
calvin

the keyboard and brought forth:

The sentence "He did not terrify anyone" should be enough to help you
work that one out.

Cheers,

Mike
--

the keyboard and brought forth:

I doubt I'll last that long, but we're in for some interesting times
if we will.

Cheers,

Mike
--

That sounded like a 'corridor of uncertainty' to me. ;o)
--
David North

The first cricket book I ever read was "King Cricket" by Gary Sobers
and it was about this tour -- neighbor of mine (who had played some
first class cricket) had the book and upon learning that I played
cricket but didn't know who Sobers was, handed the book to me to
read.  This was over 35 years ago, and as a kid who hadn't yet turned
10 (or were just about there), it made a huge impression on me, and
I'm convinced was one of they factors that started my life-long
obsession with this great game.  I had no idea who Sobers was (before
I read this book), and I remember quite a few things from the book.

Sobers has a lot of praise for Tom Graveney -- I remember him praising
Graveney for walking in a county game when Sobers took a sharp catch
("Did you catch it Gary?" "yes Tom") and then being full of praise for
his great batting.  Sobers loved Milburn as well, and rejoiced in his
calypso attitude to cricket.  Other things I recall is his description
of a long stand with his own cousin to win a Test that seemed lost.

--

That description does not really fit with any of his three substantial
partnerships with Holford in that series. In none of those cases was WI's
position particularly bad, and at Lord's they did not win.

--
David North

At Lord's, I would describe WI's position as "particularly bad". IIRC,
they were only 9 runs to the good with 5 second innings wickets down
when Holford joined Sobers. They then proceeded to have an unbroken
partnership of something like 250. Until then, I don't think anyone had
really rated the very inexperienced Holford's batting. It's true that WI
did not actually win the Test. It was arguably the turning point of the
series, though. Had England won, they would have levelled the series at
1-1, and the momentum would have been with them.
--
John Hall
          "If you haven't got anything nice to say about anybody, come
           sit next to me."
                                 Alice Roosevelt Longworth (1884-1980)

Yes, you're quite right. I must have miscalculated due to lack of time.
--
David North

No mention of David Brown or Jeff Jones ?  From memory, I'm sure they
played, and Brown/Jones or Brown/Snow put on 120-odd for the last
wicket in one of the tests.

There was also a behind-the-scenes tv documentary made at the Leeds
test, showing Graveney flinging his bat into the wall having been
brilliantly caught by - obviously - Lance Gibbs in the gulley "should
been ***y four" he remarked not too genially.  Also the first
innings of an opener who made 64 or so for England and looked pretty
god, but didn't progress.  Forgotten his name now.

And who could forget Sobers laughing on his way back to the pavilion
having been suckered into hooking Snow first ball - bottom edge, box,
dolly into Close's hands at extremely stupid short leg, his specialist
position.

Or am I remembering something else entirely ? I find that happens a
lot, lately.

Mike Gooding
--------------------

In article

Brown played in 1 Test and Jones in 2. ISTR that both were injured for
part of the summer. Hence Higgs and Snow being tried.

That partnership was between Higgs and Snow in the 5th Test.

High praise indeed. :)

Looking at the averages, I can't find anyone matching that. The openers
that England used in that series, in alphabetical order, were Amiss
(though he may have batted down the order), Barber, Boycott, Edrich and
Russell (whose highest score was only 26).

It was remarked at the time that most fielders wouldn't have caught it
because, in self-preservation, they would have turned their backs.

Close's catch definitely happened.
--
John Hall
          "If you haven't got anything nice to say about anybody, come
           sit next to me."
                                 Alice Roosevelt Longworth (1884-1980)

On Mon, 13 Oct 2008 09:18:48 -0700 (PDT), Michael Gooding

More that I couldn't be bothered to transcribe. Gist: hardly played,
wasn't worth it when he did. You can take that to be the case for
anyone else I haven't mentioned.

Cheers,

Mike
--