Kent v Gloucestershire, 50 overs, St Lawrence, 31 July 2016

Scorecard

For the first time in 19 years I find myself at Canterbury Week, at least for the first day, a one-day contest between Kent and Gloucestershire. Back then, there was something of the Edwardian stately home about it, with marquees shimmering around a third of the boundary, temporary homes for all sorts of organisations ancient and antiquated: the Buffs Regiment; the Band of Brothers; the Old Stagers; the Association of Men of Kent and Kentish Men. Now most of the house has been sold to ward off impoverishment and the family is reduced to living in a few rooms in one wing. Just five marquees remain, though readers will be relieved to learn that the High Sheriff of Kent was present, perhaps to protect us from the cowboys on the building site that occupies the Old Dover Road side of the ground. A giant crane looms over the playing field as the old lime tree once did from much the same place, an apt symbol of how things have changed. The club has done a good job in retaining the character of the playing arena thus far during the redevelopment. I hope that I can make the same report on my next visit once the building is complete.

The match was the penultimate in the group stage for both teams. A win would come close to ensuring a quarter-final place for Kent. Gloucestershire, who won the competition last year, have had a nightmare and are already out, which is disappointing (you will remember that My Life in Cricket Scorecards lived in Bristol for 19 years and spent many a freezing day on the Hammond Room roof, so retains secondary affection for Gloucestershire).

Kent won the toss and put Gloucestershire in. What followed was consistent with the timeless, retro feel of the day: the visitors proceeded at a leisurely four an over to be all out for 200 in the fiftieth over, an analogue score in the digital age.

The pitch was slow, and from the Pavilion End the odd ball stopped (as they say). Of the 13 wickets that fell, only four were to catches, and three of those were caught-and-bowled, a sure sign that timing is tricky. In these conditions Darren Stevens—the human tourniquet—was predictably abstemious, conceding only 28 from his ten overs. Will Gidman, bowling at a similar pace to Stevens, had the best figures, three for 28 in eight overs. Gidman is on loan from Nottinghamshire, but it would be good if he could be persuaded to stay; he’s more than useful and at 40 Stevens has no more than seven or eight seasons left in him.

Twenty-two-year-old bowler Charlie Hartley bowls a notch or two quicker. He claimed two wickets, both front-foot lbws. With Matt Coles getting Cockbain in the same fashion, Nos 3 to 5 in the Gloucestershire order were sent on their way by Rob Bailey. None of these decisions looked clear cut, which is not to say that they were wrong. There had been a celebration of the 80th birthday of Ray “Trigger” Julian a couple of days before and the thought occurred that umpires around the country were firing ‘em out in celebration.  

Matt Coles took the first two wickets. Like Jesse Ryder, in any other era Coles would have been regarded as a character. In our age of scientific Calvinism he is a problem, just back from suspension after a late night (or nights). He has talent and unpredictability. Is it possible to inject conformability into the mix without diluting it?

The best Gloucestershire batsman was Hamish Marshall, who is finishing at the County Ground this year after 11 seasons. It was a pleasure to see Marshall in prime form. My period as CricInfo’s man in Northern Districts coincided with Hamish and his (absolutely) identical twin James establishing themselves as first-class cricketers, to the confusion of scorers, umpires and journalists everywhere. It was not quite a valedictory as I far as I am concerned, however; it is rumoured that Marshall will play for Wellington in the coming New Zealand season.

He and Michael Klinger put on 42 for the third wicket, the biggest partnership of the innings. At 71 for two in the 18th over, things were pretty even, but by the 37th over it was 138 for eight. Tom Smith, David Payne and Matt Taylor did well to get as far as 200, but it was surprising that Kent did not try to finish the innings off. For the last ten overs only the minimum four fielders were retained inside the circle. The tailenders used the gaps in the field intelligently to take the score to the foothills of respectability. Today the difference between 150 and 200 all out was not significant, but on a pitch that was not straightforward it might have been on another day. At the risk of becoming a one-tune band, I will ask my usual question: what would McCullum do?

Kent’s top order are in rich form at the moment. Daniel Bell-Drummond and Joe Denly were largely untroubled, though the odd ball from the Pavilion End was still struggling to make it  all the way to the batsman. Once past 50, the shots came more freely, with Denly in particular happy to come down the pitch. The partnership was at 92 when Bell-Drummond played around a straight one to be bowled by Howell. This equalled the record for Kent’s first wicket in one-day cricket against Gloucestershire, matching Luckhurst and Johnson in the Gillette Cup in 1972 (I didn’t see that one).

Sam Northeast picks up where he left off each time he comes up to bat at the moment. Like Bell-Drummond, it was a surprise when he was out, to a sharp return catch to Payne. There are vacancies for batsmen in the test team. On form, Bell-Drummond and Northeast have as good a bid as anyone. Will their being being second division players be an insurmountable objection?

Sam Billings, on top of the world a week before for England A, left his timing at home today. What had been brilliantly audacious reverse sweeps were now mere errors of judgement.

Joe Denly was there throughout for 82. He is also playing very well, though his time as an international player has probably passed. Darren Stevens (who else?) saw him through to the end and finished the game with a six onto the bank on the south side of the ground.

A mundane game to finish my visit to the old country, but days in the sun at Canterbury are precious and never disagreeable.

Kent came second in the group, and played Yorkshire in the quarter-final, a game that I was able to watch on TV back in New Zealand. Kent chased 256 on a pitch much like that the Gloucestershire game was played on. Against Yorkshire’s international attack they came just 11 runs short (and the lbw that ended the innings not even Trigger Julian would have given). It supported the view I formed during my short visit that the old county is in better shape on the field than it has been for a while.

England A v Pakistan A, 50 overs, St Lawrence Ground, 24 July 2016

Scorecard

Two new spectating experiences came my way on my recent trip to the old country: floodlit cricket at Canterbury (of which more later) and an A international, England v Pakistan.

The game was part of a tri-series also involving Sri Lanka. This was the fifth and penultimate game; thus far England had won both their matches and Pakistan had defeated Sri Lanka twice.

It was a chance to see some of the young guns of English cricket: Ben Duckett, who is stacking up the runs for Northamptonshire; Brett D’Oliveira, the latest chapter of a marvellous story; and most of all the Curran brothers, infant prodigies with the ball.

It was another perfect day. My three weeks in Kent were blessed with weather reminiscent of 1976, the gold standard of English summers. A day to bat, one would have thought, but Pakistan put England in.

At 49 for four in the tenth over it looked a good decision. All four wickets fell to Bilawal Bhatti, a skiddy medium-fast right armer who CricInfo says is only five foot six, but perhaps the margin of error that applies to the measurement of the ages of Pakistan’s cricketers has been extended to their height. Bilawal maintained a superb line on and just outside off stump and induced errors from batsmen who were looking to force the pace early on a good pitch. Both Bell-Drummond and Duckett went driving at balls on this line. Bilawal was nowhere near the pace that his 30-yard run up suggested, but he was quick enough.

Bilawal was removed from the attack after seven overs, not to reappear until the end of the innings, when he was expensive against a rampant Billings. I ask my usual question: “what would McCullum have done?” “Used him as an attacking force earlier” is, of course, the answer.

Kent’s own Sam Billings came in second down and won the game with an innings that was among the best I have seen in one-day cricket: 175 from a tricky situation. He began with a shot that was a perfect imitation of that which Colin Cowdrey wished to execute as his “last act on Earth”—a drive down to the lime tree. I have always thought that impending mortality fogged Cowdrey’s mind a little as the tree (now a younger version, but in much the same place) is behind square, so it would be more of an outside edge, hardly a fitting way for such an elegant batsman to shuffle off this mortal coil. But Billings dispelled that misconception with a genuine drive to that very place.

It became clear that Billings has an astonishingly broad repertoire of shots, some of which Cowdrey would not have conceived of, let alone attempted. Neither the forward nor backward defensive are prominent among them. Billings has a McCullumesque belief in attack as the best course of action when backs are to the wall.

108 of his 175 came in boundaries, including four sixes. The prize for audacity of shot—fiercely contested—was won in the 49th over when Billings changed to a left-handed stance as the ball was released and pulled a six over what a second before had been cover. What will the next step be in the quest for surprise? The way Billings and co are going it might be the batsman producing a golf club at the moment of delivery, or the bowler finding that the ball has turned into a dove as he releases it. It was a treat to see Billings of Kent batting with such talent and skill on a rare international occasion at St Lawrence.

Billings put on 125 for the fifth wicket with Liam Livingstone of Lancashire. To say that Livingstone is partial to the onside is like saying that Winnie the Pooh enjoys the odd drop of honey. Both are good at finding what pleases them, but trouble sometimes results. Livingstone made deep incursions into the offside to make space for a legside biff, and did so with some success. He beat Billings to fifty, which not many do these days. Though he twice dispatched slow left-armer Mohammad Nawaz into the building site that occupies the northern side of the ground, the ball turning away from Livingstone caused him some difficulty and he must learn not to spurn half the field if he is to do take his talent to a higher level.

Eighty-nine came from the final ten overs, which was as good as Pakistan could have realistically hoped for. England finished on 324 for eight, a tall order but possible on a trustworthy pitch.

The Curran brothers opened the attack and both claimed an early wicket. I saw a lot of their late father Kevin in his Gloucestershire days. Only the qualification criteria prevented him from being an international cricketer. It looks as if both his boys will surpass him in this respect; they have his talent, and perhaps a touch more purpose.

Jaahid Ali and skipper Babar Azam put on 97 for the third wicket at a decent pace. Babar made a half-century the last time I saw him, at the Basin’s ODI earlier this year. Now he made another, just as composed.

The partnership was progressing well when, in the 20th over, Jaahid went down the pitch to slow left-armer Dawson only for the ball to pass the outside edge. Billings’ hands did not move and a straightforward stumping chance was missed. Jaahid was on 39 at the time, and went on to make a century. More than that, when he was out, in the 39th over, Pakistan were five down requiring a shade over nine an over. Had he stayed there for just a few more overs he might have won the game for Pakistan. Billings’ miss was closer to costing England the game—and negating his own brilliant innings—than the apparently comfortable 56-run margin of victory suggests.

It was good to see the Campaign for Real Ale flourishing still, its marquee bursting at every match I attended. What about a Campaign for Real Wicketkeepers? Billings’ international class as a batsman is obvious; his lack of it as a keeper equally so. He has this is common with all the other contenders including Bairstow and Buttler. All are capable of winning the game with the bat and losing it with the gloves. England’s profusion of all-rounders offers the selectors all sorts of options. One is to pick the best wicketkeeper in the country; it would win a test match soon enough.

Who is the best keeper in England? It would be interesting to hear the views of those who watch county cricket.

Only last year Mark Wood was first choice as the back up to Anderson and Broad for England. Injury has laid him low, but on the evidence of this performance he will be a strong contender again soon. Wood generates real pace from a short run up and bowls with intimidating intelligence. He ended Jaahid’s threatening innings and followed up with two more soon after to close out the game. Dawson also impressed, exercising control in mid-innings.

It was a treat for an occasional spectator to see so much young home talent in one place. Well done the ECB (and we don’t hear that very often) for offering Pakistan the chance to develop its second rank, a level that has always been a deficiency in that country’s game, even in more stable times. For all the grand talk about a global game, cricket’s talent is concentrated in just a few places. Preserving it where it already exists must be a priority over speculative expansion.

Kent v Sussex, County Championship, Tunbridge Wells, 18 July 2016 (second day)

Scorecard

Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells wasn’t even mildly disgruntled. How could he be on such a perfect day? It was 30 degrees celsius (though 86 fahrenheit would be more in the spirit of the retro atmosphere). Rumour had it that in the committee marquee, ties were loosened. The location was gorgeous, the ice cream cold, the beer nicely tepid and the cricket decent, though the last was the least decisive of these factors in making it a relishable day.

Traditionally, the Tunbridge Wells Festival took place at the beginning of June when the rhododendrons made a purple wall of the northern side of the ground, rather like the Christmas scarlet of the pohutukawas at the Basin Reserve. However, the Nevill Ground is less reliant than the Basin on seasonal blooming for its beauty. Marquees shimmer down one side of the ground; opposite, an urban forest shelters the playing area from the traffic—from the twenty-first century in general, in fact. Add a quaint pavilion (rebuilt just before World War One after the original was burned down by suffragettes) and you see why this ground is considered among England’s finest.

CricInfo’s report on the first day described it as a “day for purists”. This was probably not meant kindly, but did not deter more than 2,000 people from turning up this sunny Monday. From this we learn that there is an audience for first-class cricket if it is played in nice places when the sun shines.

Kent resumed at 310 for three, with Sam Northeast and Darren Stevens well-established. Stevens has been one of My Life in Cricket Scorecards’ favourite cricketers since his sublime final-day double century to beat Lancashire three years ago. He deposited Briggs over the deep-square-leg boundary in the second over of the morning, but an attempt at a repeat sent the ball straight up in the air.

Alex Blake replaced Stevens and looked at ease immediately. Blake, a left-hander, has a good technique and straightforward approach, finding his range by lifting Briggs into the trees at deep mid-wicket. He reached his fifty with a similar shot, before falling leg before to the same bowler. Umpire Nick Cook, a distinguished slow left-armer, had the finger up like a shot in sympathy with his fellow practitioner, and did well to restrain himself from joining in with the appeal.

Meanwhile, Sam Northeast just rolled on, in the manner of the Mississippi. He reached his century with a flick off the pads off leg-spinner Beer. Northeast seems a popular choice as captain, unlike some of his predecessors.

With the pitch offering nothing to any bowler, Sussex captain Luke Wright tried a ruse. There is nothing like a skipper’s crackpot theory to brighten the day and this was one of the best . It was a modern take on the umbrella field of the Bodyline era, with the difference that all the fielders were in front of the batsman, six of them initially, from short cover to short mid-wicket. Australian seamer Steve Magoffin was the bowler.

Northeast responded to the conundrum with the ease of Stephen Hawking finding the square root of four. He simply hit the ball to the boundary through the gaps between the catchers (once for four and once for three). The experiment continued in Magoffin’s next over though with fewer personnel. An edge by Northeast through the now-vacated slip area (just about the only edge all day) brought it to an end.

Perhaps there is something in the Tunbridge Wells air that affects Sussex captains. It was here in a Sunday League game in 1994 that Allan Wells set an 8:1 legside field with Neil Taylor the batsman, late on in Kent’s run chase. I’m not sure who the bowler was. Eddie Hemmings was playing for Sussex (I’d forgotten that he’d finished his career at Hove), but I can’t imagine that he’s have stood for it. Anyway, Taylor dealt with it as easily as Northeast did today, by stepping back and biffing it into the void.

Wright’s Professor Branestawm field placing helped Northeast to accelerate after passing the hundred mark, going at more than a run a ball until he became becalmed in the 180s, which is not the worst place for the wind to drop. The frustration led to a false shot and a diving return catch for Magoffin. The innings wrapped up soon afterwards for 575, leaving Kent seven sessions or so to bowl Sussex out twice.

To open the attack, a tall one and a round one, but as unlikely a combination as Stan Laurel and Thomas Hardy: Kagiso Rabada (21) all pace and muscle, and Darren Stevens (40) all waddle and guile. In the opening overs Stevens proved as mean as a German Brexit negotiator, conceding two from his first five overs. It’s the slowing down as he passes the umpire that fools ‘em. It is quite a time for 40s achievers with Misbah’s hundred at Lord’s, and Mickleson and Stenson battling it out at the Open. Stevens will probably give it another five years.

The best contest of the day was that between Rabada and Sussex opener Chris Nash, who looked uncomfortable and hurried  several times in the opening overs but then responded with a series of sweetly timed square and cover drives. Reaching the boundary was an achievement in itself; the outfield was rough, bumpy and as slow as an Ingmar Bergman plot.

The only wicket to fall went to Mitch Claydon, as old school as a Latin primer. Harry Finch played back to one that kept a little low, and was bowled. Sussex finished the day on 69 for one, 506 behind.

This was a day from a picture book of an idealised English settings, probably the one in which John Major found his village green and bobbies on bicycles. These scenes don’t exist in real life, but may occasionally materialise like Brigadoon (hopefully without the bagpipes). The chances of being there when it happens are infinitesimal, but today it happened for me. I'm sure that I glimpsed a suffragette with a box of matches and a petrol can.

Towards the end of the day it seemed that the pitch was offering glimmers of hope to the bowlers: a little variable bounce here, a hint of turn there. These were nothing but mirages, as Sussex, though made to follow on, batted through the two remaining days comfortably enough in my absence. Their hero was none other than Ross Taylor, with 142 not out and 68, but I can get that at home.

Norman Graham

Following the recent celebration of Alan Knott on his seventieth birthday, some readers have requested more on Kent players of the golden era. I will take Brian Carpenter’s suggestion of Norman Graham first, partly because Graham was a favourite then but rather forgotten since, and partly because Brian is responsible for my name being mentioned (and kindly at that) in the 2016 Wisden, in his review of cricket blogs.

From time to time I have set about compiling an XI of players of the past who would would have no place in the modern game, not from lack of ability, but because they would not meet contemporary fitness standards. But this is a hard call. What are the criteria for selection?

For example, some would put Colin Cowdrey at the top of the list. A cheer would rise around St Lawrence when he chased the ball to the boundary every couple of years or so. Yet Cowdrey was a talented sportsman and superb slip who, in a later era would have romped around the field like his sons Chris and Graham, both of whom were excellent fielders. So he doesn’t qualify.

In my piece on Derek Underwood I suggested that many a modern coach would have taken one look at a 17-year-old bowler with round shoulders, cigarette on, and the acceleration of a Morris Marina and pointed towards the gate with no need for further discussion. But while Underwood never quite shook off giving the impression that whenever he ran, it was through an invisible trough of treacle, he became a highly dependable fielder capable of the occasional remarkable catch: one at Gloucester in the Sunday League in 1979 sticks in the mind, running back from mid on to stretch out a hand to dismiss Jim Foat when most of us hadn’t thought it a chance.

So not Underwood either.

In fact there are only two players who I would have as stone-cold certainties for this team (the Bradman and Hobbs of the lumbering, if you will). One was playing at the Wagon Works Ground that day and was, to nobody’s surprise, run out: David Shepherd, later one of the great umpires, then a spherical Gloucestershire batsman.

The other: Norman Graham.

Graham opened the bowling for Kent for a decade, one that encompassed almost all of the glory years. He contended with Tony Greig for the title of tallest first-class cricketer of the time, being six foot seven or thereabouts. But before we consider what Norman Graham was, let us address what he wasn’t: he was neither a batsman nor a fielder.

Every team used to have one. Some had two, or even three: a No 11 batsman who was never absolutely certain if he was a right or left-hander. They have disappeared almost completely. I watched a one-day game from Taunton on TV last week. Somerset wanted 60 when the last man, Tim Groenewald, came in. He proceeded to knock them off while doing a passable imitation of Walter Hammond.

Norman Graham wasn’t the worst batsman I have seen; Kevin Jarvis was comfortably that. When the two batted together Graham was at No 10, as he was when he and John Dye were both in the team. One shot sticks in the mind when many by real batsmen have disappeared, because it was such a surprise. St Lawrence, August 1972: Graham plonks the long left leg well down the pitch and drives Johnny Gleeson of the Australians over mid off and to the boundary, two bounces. There was a gasp, then a cheer as loud as for anything in the match.

Another thing that has gone from first-class cricket is third man. Until quite recently, there was invariably a third man from the start of the innings, but these days it seems that no matter how often the ball finds its way there, captains will no more deploy a fielder in that area than they would in a minefield (even though it takes only a couple of cover boundaries for them to install a sweeper for the duration; I sense my inner Fred Trueman emerging).

One reason for this may be that third man is no longer required to fill the role for arthritic fielders that country parishes did for the stupid sons of the aristocracy: to be somewhere for them to hide.

Norman Graham spent much of his time at third man. If the ball came straight to him, all would be well, provided that he had enough notice to get the bending down organised. He had a powerful and accurate throw.

If a pursuit were needed, it would start like a farm tractor on a frosty morning. When the ball beat him he would throw back his head and smile in surprise, as if that were only the second time that season that one had eluded him, rather than the third time that over, as was more probably the case. On the odd occasion when the ball was intercepted, its progress would be allayed by a large boot, and would then rest awhile while it waited for Graham to return from the distant point where he had managed to stop and turn.

There was obviously no question of him diving. Had he done so, it would have required the equipment and expertise necessary to right a felled giraffe to have restored him to the vertical.

What Norman Graham did so very well, was to bowl. Go to 23:30 here to see him in action in the Benson & Hedges Final of 1973. At first glance he does not look much at all: a 12-pace amble to the crease a prelude to a delivery action that Richie Benaud fairly describes as “ungainly”. Yet he took 614 first-class wickets, and a further 172 in one-day cricket.

His height meant that the ball reached the batsman at a steeper angle than his pace suggested, a sort of bargain basement Glenn McGrath. Like the great Australian, Graham bowled with a proofreader’s accuracy, searching out whatever assistance the pitch had to offer.

He established himself as a regular in 1967, when he finished third in the national averages with 104 wickets at 13.9. At Bradford early that season, Geoff Boycott bagged the only pair of his career, bowled Graham in the first innings, caught Knott bowled Graham in the second.

Let’s look again at that 55-over trophy win in ‘73. In seven matches he took 11 for 206, conceded at just under three an over. Remember that then the opening bowlers were usually the death bowlers too. Norman Graham was as important as Derek Underwood in that one-day attack. He played in three Lord’s finals and Kent won them all (it is often forgotten that he pulled out of the ‘71 Gillette final on the morning of the game; in his absence the partnership of Hughes and Simmons at the end of Lancashire’s innings made all the difference).

The public showed its appreciation during his benefit year in 1976, when it was said that he visited every pub in Kent. Perhaps not absolutely true, but within the margin of error. He was rewarded with a declared return of £70,000 (the average house price in England in 1976 was £13,000). It was rumoured that the actual figure was somewhat higher, but camouflaged so as not to provoke Her Majesty’s tax inspectors into a review of the tax-free status of cricketers’ benefits. This was an appreciation of Norman Graham’s skill, and of his whole-hearted effort. More than that, it acknowledged that here was a cricketer who set out to enjoy the game and was proud to play it.

If it is the case that cricket would not have room for a Norman Graham these days, the game is the worse for it.

Wounded Tiger by Peter Oborne

Peter Oborne is a political journalist with a pleasing sideline in cricket books; meaty, important cricket books that fill gaps in cricket scholarship. His biography of Basil D’Oliveira was masterful. He has followed it with Wounded Tiger, a history of cricket in Pakistan.

Has a cricket book ever been based on so much hard journalism? In an era when Pakistan is regarded as a no-go zone for westerners, his pursuit of the facts took him not only to the main centres of Lahore and Karachi, but also to places such as Peshawar, an hour away from the border with Afghanistan, where western visitors are usually war reporters not cricket historians. He records his inability to go to Baluchistan and Kashmir (the most militarised place in the world, we learn) as if it amounted to professional negligence. All in the cause of cricket scholarship.

The collection of primary evidence through interviews was essential because source documentary material on the early days of Pakistan cricket does not exist. I have been reading reviews of the latest work by the pre-eminent Tudor historian John Guy, (my tutor at Bristol University a long time ago). Addressing himself to the last two decades of Elizabeth’s reign, Guy has done what he always does: he has gone back to the primary sources and rebuilt the story. He had more to work on from England four centuries ago than Oborne has on Pakistan cricket a few decades past. Of course, many of the oral accounts are incomplete and contradictory, but Oborne guides us through them skilfully.

His biography of D’Oliveira and its account of cricket under Apartheid dealt with the old canard that cricket and politics should not mix. Like non-white South Africans, Pakistani players might have wished that they had the luxury of choice. Pakistan’s cricket emerged from politics in its rawest form: the turmoil of the partition of India in 1947. Some of the most famous names of the early decades of Pakistan cricket were among the the millions of Muslims forced to flee to the new country, including the five Mohammad brothers, four of whom were to play test cricket. I saw Mushtaq and Sadiq play often enough in county cricket, but had not appreciated how perilous their early lives had been.

Politics sets the game’s parameters today more than ever. The UAE appears to be an indefinite home from home, while relations with India mean that Pakistani cricketers—only Pakistani cricketers—are forbidden to milk the golden goat that is the IPL.

As millions struggled their way north and west in 1947, one Muslim was making the journey in the opposite direction. Fazal Mahmood travelled from Punjab in the north of the emerging country to Poona, “an insanely dangerous journey for a twenty-year-old Muslim male”. He had been selected in the Indian team for the tour of Australia and he was determined to make the training camp, oblivious to the chaos and danger, but eventually had to give in to political inevitability.

Fazal Mahmood is the first of heroes of Pakistan cricket whose stories Oborne tells; Wounded Tiger begins ingeniously with Fazal in the crowd at the Oval, watching as England wins the Ashes in 1953. A year later he was back, bowling Pakistan to series-squaring victory with twelve wickets.

That the young country was playing test cricket at all was remarkable, given that its domestic cricket was sparse and somewhat chaotic. How come it was granted almost immediate test status? Oborne puts it down to a victory against an MCC touring team (missing a few big names) in 1951. India proposed Pakistan and England seconded. Perhaps the inclusion of a seventh test team to fill an empty summer in 1954 appealed to Lord’s.

The safe passage of the Mohammad brothers was as well for Pakistan’s first decades of test cricket. Hanif Mohammad usually batted as if surviving a nuclear winter, the essence of a young nation making its way against the odds. Oborne presents Mushtaq Mohammad as one of Pakistan’s most under-rated and best captains, genially presiding over one of its most successful periods in the 1970s.

By then, most of the Pakistan team were familiar to us on the county circuit. Sarfraz Nawaz bustling in with short, angry steps at Northampton; Imran Khan, filmstar pace at Worcester and Hove; Zaheer Abbas, a double and single hundred in one game at Canterbury in the golden summer of ‘76. Above all, Asif Iqbal, dancing down the pitch to lash it through the covers. (How uncomfortable that the source of Pakistani matchfixing can be traced to Sharjah while Asif was in charge there). That county experience, and Kerry Packer, turned Pakistan’s players into professionals, no longer happy to be amateurs with jobs tied to the game.

Javed Miandad comes out of this account well. He has often been presented in the western press as some sort of upstart street urchin. In fact, his origins were firmly middle-class. Oborne credits him with accepting the captaincy at difficult times then gracefully stepping down for Imran Khan whenever the great man made himself available.

Oborne (who, it might be noted, has usually written for right-wing newspapers) is consistently critical of the attitudes of the English players, administrators and media towards Pakistan. He is scathing about the Idrais Baig incident on the MCC (in modern terms an England A team) tour in 1955, using MCC archives to tell a more complete version of the story than has been available before.

Baig was an umpire whose performance had displeased the MCC players. In Peshawar, Baig was taken from his hotel, bound and gagged, moved across town and then drenched with water. It was serious assault, but was laughed off by the MCC team and management as only a joke, the go-to excuse for bullies through the ages.

Oborne’s assessment of the “finger-wagging” incident at Faisalabad in 1987 is that it was incompetently handled by those in charge on both sides. But he makes a telling comment about Mike Gatting: “It is hard to come to grips with the set of values which led the England captain to take such a strong stand against allegedly poor Pakistani umpiring, yet be relaxed enough about apartheid to take a rebel squad to South Africa”.

The middle part of the book tends towards a series-by-series recitation. There is much good cricket played by many good cricketers—Abdul Qadir’s story is told with particular relish—as well as a good deal of selectorial mercuriality, players falling out, administrators with varying degrees of competence and cricketing knowledge, and a revolving door approach to the captaincy. The clues to how this came about are littered through the book and often come down to politics, cricketing, national and international.

The story of last quarter-century is related in themes and is the best part of the book. There is the glorious story of reverse swing, a new dimension to the game achieved only with immense skill; needless to say, the British press assumed it was those Pakistanis cheating again.  

The chapter on betting and match-fixing is the book’s saddest. It is clear that Pakistan cricket has been cursed (Oborne’s description) by the bookmakers for several decades. He makes an interesting comparison with prohibition in the United States in the 1920s, concluding that a legalised and regulated cricket betting market would be the best way of exercising control. He visited Mohammad Amir while the young bowler was serving his ban for the Lord’s no-balls. Oborne finds him playing tapeball cricket with the other village lads. He rightly presents the brilliant young bowler as a victim who stood little chance of being able to resist the massive pressure he came under from bookmakers and senior players. I am pleased to have seen Mohammad Amir play at the Basin Reserve earlier this year and hope that the cricket fraternity welcomes him when Pakistan’s tour of the UK begins in a couple of weeks.

I had not understood before reading the book how cricket was an urban, middle-class sport in Pakistan, and that its spread to the lower classes and the rural north and west is recent. Pakistan has achieved a broadening of interest in the game that the ECB and ICC aspire to but can’t deliver. One consequence has been the emergence of Afghanistan as a cricketing country: poppies on a battlefield.

Of course, 9/11 changed everything for Pakistan cricket. Home test matches were spasmodic thereafter, and ended indefinitely with the attack on the Sri Lankan team bus in 2009. Out of that and the spot fixing scandal emerges the final hero of the story: Misbah-ul-Haq.

Misbah took over the Test captaincy with his predecessor facing imprisonment, unusually difficult circumstances even when judged by the regicidal standards of that office. What’s more, he was a 36-year-old batsman who had never quite established himself in the test side. Oborne sums up:

The task that he faced was more difficult than any previous Test captain, including Kardar. He had to lead a cricket team in exile, deal with constant charges of corruption and match-fixing, and confront a chaotic administration.

Almost six years later, Misbah is still there having won more tests than any other captain of Pakistan with a victory percentage only fractionally below Wasim Akram’s lead mark, all without playing a single test at home.

Needless to say, some of the most famous names in Pakistan cricket are calling for him to be replaced for the tour of England. At this time, more than any, they were lucky to stumble upon him.

My most serious criticism of this fine book is the statement on page 261 that Wasim Bari was in 1976 “the world’s top wicketkeeper”. Readers would, I think, be disappointed if I did not assert the rights of the Kentish candidate to that title.

Wounded Tiger was Wisden’s Book of the Year in 2015 and deservedly so. We must hope that Peter Oborne will soon shine his torch of journalism and scholarship into another of cricket’s dusty corners.

Watching Godfrey Evans

Following last week’s piece on one great Kent and England wicketkeeper, here is something about another.

I have seen Godfrey Evans play cricket. Proper cricket that is, a County Championship game. Given that Evans retired in 1959, I flatter myself that this would surprise acquaintances.  

It was Canterbury Week 1967. Alan Knott was to make his test debut at Trent Bridge, so Evans was called up to replace him in the second match of the week, against Yorkshire, the leaders. Kent were second in the table and as it turned out, this was the deciding game. Yorkshire’s seven-wicket win gave them 12 points; the margin between the two teams at season’s end was ten. Here’s the scorecard.

Perhaps it was the importance of the match that prompted Kent to recall Evans (47) to the colours, but it still seems a bit odd, given the presence of David Nicholls in the Kent team. Nicholls took the gloves for the following game, against Essex, and deputised for Knott most capably for the next ten years. Then again, Evans was the world’s most experienced international player with 91 tests (Colin Cowdrey would draw level with him at Trent Bridge the following day). He was demonstrating age-defying agility and co-ordination on television for the International Cavaliers most Sundays. For the biggest match that Kent had played since the First World War, why not choose experience?

I was there on the first day, a beautiful, blue-sky Wednesday, as all days of childhood summers are in the memory, in defiance of the historical record (it was the summer of love, probably because people needed something to do out of the rain). We sat on the benches on the Bat and Ball side of the ground. I haven’t watched from there since, not for more than a few minutes anyway.

The crowd was large, more than would be allowed in these days, though several thousand short of the number at the Gillette Cup semi-final a three weeks before, when the boundary shortened as the day wore on to accommodate the growing throng.

Brian Close was away, captaining England. He achieved five wins in six tests that summer, but had the captaincy taken away from him for the winter tour as a result of time-wasting at Edgbaston, or at least his cussed reaction to accusations thereof. The committee room at Lord’s hid well its disappointment at having to reinstate Colin Cowdrey (Tonbridge and Brasenose). Fred Trueman captained Yorkshire in Close’s absence. Seven of his team had played test cricket; three more were to do so and the eleventh, opening bowler Tony Nicholson, should have done. Trueman no doubt took the opportunity to drop into the Kent dressing room before the game to appraise them of this information. Perhaps Evans was there to redress the balance off the field as well as on it.

Guile and precision had long since taken the place of brutish pace in Trueman’s bowling, but he was still quick enough to break Brian Luckhurst’s hand in his opening spell. Stuart Leary dug in with a somewhat uncharacteristic three-and-half-hour 66 (a few weeks later he became the only batsman I ever saw clear the old lime tree), but the memory of the day that lingers is of Alan Brown tonking Trueman for 18 off four balls late in the innings.

Brown was a fast bowler with a dragging action, one of the last to carry this legacy of the backfoot lbw law. He played in two tests on Ted Dexter’s tour of Pakistan in 1961/2, when the prospect of playing cricket in south Asia did not have the attraction for the leading players that it does today. But it was Brown’s tailend slogging that caught the imagination of the boy on the boundary that day. The Kent faithful thought that in giving Trueman a sense of his own fallibility Brown was doing him a service, but two for 39 from ten overs shows how well the great bowler had bowled earlier in the innings.

Trueman greeted Evans’ entry at No 8 by doffing his cap and dusting the batting crease with it. Evans made ten before taking his position behind the timbers (as Brian Johnston used to say) for the final hour or so of the day. I have no specific memory of his keeping, but have no reason to doubt Wisden’s report that he “kept wicket superbly”.

Yorkshire won the game quite easily by seven wickets and took the second of a hat-trick of Championships. There is debate about whether the current Yorkshire team, attempting to emulate this feat this season, is better than that of the sixties. If they are, nobody will touch them.

The 1967 season ended happily for Kent nevertheless. Three weeks later the Gillette Cup was won at Lord’s and the glory years began.

Thirteen years later Evans gave an altogether more memorable display of his skill and extraordinary longevity. It was Old England v Old Australia at the Oval in 1980, played on the day before the centenary test began at Lord’s, a match now remembered for Dickie Bird’s fussiness over a damp patch in the outfield that denied a full house most of Saturday’s play.

The previous Wednesday was fine. It was nostalgic at the time. Reading the scorecard makes it seem all the more so in retrospect. It reminds me that I saw Neil Harvey play. One of the 1948 Invincibles. That’s quite something. He stood at mid on in sunglasses (long before this was customary) then finished the game with a composed 22 not out. It was the only time I saw Ken Barrington. He lifted a six onto the tin roof of the old stand beside the pavilion, an enormous hit. Little more than six months later he was dead, on duty as assistant manager with England in the Caribbean. A last chance to see most of the rest. All echoes of the players they once were of course, but an echo can carry sufficient cadence to identify the original tune.

Which brings us back to Godfrey Evans, by now 60. The card shows that he stumped both Australian openers off Fred Titmus. One was straightforward, but the manner of the other (Bobby Simpson I think), suggested that Evans had forsaken the hard stuff a while before and had instead been drinking exclusively from the fountain of youth. The ball slid down the legside, the batsman lifted his foot for a second, and with a blur of the gloves, the bails were off.

The PA announcer declared that the batsman had been bowled. There was confusion among the cognoscenti; we didn’t know whether to trust the evidence of our binoculars. But there it is on the scorecard. Stumped. The muttonchop whiskers might have belonged to a crewman of the Jolly Roger, but the feet and hands were those of Peter Pan.

Our story now moves forward to January 1999 and the Ashes test at Sydney. On the second day my seat in the Churchill Stand* was next to two elderly sisters and the husband of one of them. It was unclear to me to which he was married, and he seemed hazy on the matter too. They were up from the country for a day at the test, as had been their habit since the war (almost certainly the second one). Their dress and demeanor suggested that they had come all the way from 1948. I asked them about the players they had seen. The name that produced the broadest smile and a faraway look in the women’s eyes was that of Godfrey Evans. “Such a showman...the best wicketkeeper we have seen.”

During the lunch interval Evans, passing the winter hosting supporters’ tours, appeared in the stand. When I drew his presence to their attention, they sighed and become young again for a moment.

Godfrey Evans died just five months later, his ability to enchant unabated to the end.

*Named after the rugby league legend Clive Churchill. It would be frustrating being named Churchill and having something named after you. Nobody would realise it was about you.