Valiant Cricketer

Alan Hill

Description

Three times an Ashes winner, Trevor Bailey is regarded next to Ian Botham as England's premier allrounder since the Second World War. He was a schoolboy prodigy at Dulwich College and won cricket and soccer blues at Cambridge University and an FA Amateur Cup winners' medal with Walthamstow in 1951-2. At the heart of the story is the fighting spirit of a loyalist that served England – and his home county, Essex – so well in a crisis. He was at his greatest when the tensions ran high, especially in one of the most celebrated of rearguard actions against Australia at Lord's in 1953. Bailey played in 61 Tests in which he became then only the second Englishman after Wilfred Rhodes to score 2000 runs and take 100 wickets. His cricket acumen in retirement brought him to the attention of another, listening public as a broadcaster on the BBC's Test Match Special programme.

Sujets

• Críquet
• Cricket

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing
• Date de parution: 26 juillet 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781909178021
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

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Published by Pitch Publishing 2012 Text 2011 Alan Hill
Alan Hill has asserted his rights in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
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eBook ISBN: 9781909178021
13-digit ISBN: 9781908051868
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Also by Alan Hill
The Family Fortune – A Saga of Sussex Cricket
A Chain of Spin Wizards
Hedley Verity – A Portrait of a Cricketer
Johnny Wardle – Cricket Conjurer
Les Ames
Herbert Sutcliffe – Cricket Maestro
Bill Edrich
Peter May
Jim Laker
The Bedsers – Twinning Triumphs
Brian Close – Cricket’s Lionheart
Daring Young Men – The Story of England’s Victorious Tour of Australia and New Zealand, 1954/55
Tony Lock – Aggressive Master of Spin
CONTENTS
Foreword by Doug Insole, CBE
Introduction
1: PLAYGROUND OF DREAMS
2: NURTURING A CRICKET PRODIGY
3: OVERTURES OF A BEGINNER
4: THE “BOIL” AT SOCCER
5: ESSEX TO THE CORE
6: OPENING UP IN TWO HEMISPHERES
7: THE BARNACLE TAKES GUARD
8: COUNSELLOR IN TESTING TIMES
9: THE CRICKETING GYPSIES OF ESSEX
10: MARVELS AND MISHAPS ON THE VELD
11: THE BEST BEFORE BOTHAM
12: RECORD DOUBLE AT HOME
13: BEHIND THE MICROPHONE
EPILOGUE: AT HOME WITH THE BAILEYS
Bibliography
Statistical Appendix Compiled By Paul E. Dyson
Picture Section
Index
DEDICATION
Celebrating a proud cricket and teaching union and recording my thanks to the Bailey and Wilcox families for their memories of a great cricketer.
FOREWORD
by Doug Insole
Trevor was one of the very few young cricketers to establish a reputation during the war years. He was quite outstanding as a schoolboy, and featured prominently in the very limited amount of representative cricket that was played at that time. In consequence, much was expected from him on his demobilisation from the Forces in 1946, which is when I first met him, on the football field at Cambridge. When he first played cricket for the University, having enjoyed a few games with Essex in the previous summer, he was full of confidence, much of which was justified. He was the quickest bowler in England at that time and he saw his future as the leader of his country’s bowling attack, but he changed his mind rapidly when, after playing a full season, he realised that he was not strong enough physically to be a tearaway fast bowler. He then set about remodelling his action and his method, and over the next couple of seasons he developed into a fast-medium performer able to move the ball away in the air and back off the seam. He also decided, quite deliberately, over the same period that his greatest value as a batsman would be as a “sheet anchor” in the middle of the order. These were two pieces of self-analysis that typified his subsequent approach to the game. If, in his very early years, Trevor was not the most popular man on the cricketing circuit it was largely because of his single-mindedness and his determination to succeed. He describes himself in his autobiography as “spoilt, petulant and a bad loser” but he was his own most severe critic and quickly became something of a perfectionist in respect of his own abilities. Over the years he became famous for his match-saving performances – some of which turned into match-winning efforts. The 1953 series against Australia probably provided his most appreciated contributions to the cause. Trevor was the most astute on-the-field tactician of his generation. His acute observations of the strengths and weaknesses of opponents proved invaluable to the captains with whom he played. My feeling is that over the years his merit as a cricketer has become devalued. Sir Ian Botham apart, he was England’s best all-rounder in the post-war years, and several of his achievements as an opening bowler for his country were remarkable. His value to Essex over two decades is incalculable and the loyalty and enthusiasm that he showed for his county was quite exceptional. As a friend, colleague and travelling companion over 65 years, he was great company. He was generous, had a good sense of humour and was intelligent. He was also a very good judge of a cricketer, as he demonstrated many times on Test Match Special , and a shrewd correspondent as he showed in his writing for the Financial Times and in several books. Trevor was a genuine all-rounder, in life as in cricket, where his contribution to the game on and off the field takes a lot beating.
INTRODUCTION
ANOTHER mighty oak was felled in 2011 to reduce still further the dwindling band of legendary cricketers from England’s glory days in the 1950s. Trevor Bailey, the amateur in status but the ultra-professional competitor in action, died in tragic circumstances in a fire at his residential home in Essex. The sadness at his passing so abruptly was worsened by the fact that he was physically unbowed. At 87, the threads of memory were broken but he was still able to recall his beginnings as a cricketer at the Alleyn Court Preparatory School at Westcliff. “Look,” he would invariably say, as he briskly escorted us to our car from his retirement home, “just over the garden wall there was my old school.” The adjacent school playing field was small enough, he said, for him, as a 12-year-old, to hit sixes. Trevor Bailey proceeded via Dulwich and Cambridge to gather the trinkets of fame in abundance. Yet I believe that his true heart lay in the closely-knit circle of family and friends in his native Essex. “They adored him at Westcliff,” remember his grandchildren, Laura and Luke. The town was justly proud of its famous son but equally were able to welcome him without reserve or deference. Trevor, in his turn, never forgot the debts he owed to his first cricket mentor and headmaster, Denys Wilcox, the former Essex and Cambridge captain, at Westcliff and other tutors during his halcyon days at Dulwich College. Westcliff was Trevor’s childhood home and, in a succession of family homes throughout more than 62 years of a devoted marriage to Greta, he never moved more than half-a-mile. As he said, it may not have been adventurous, but it made moving easier. One of the best named of his addresses, which often caused a round of laughter among cricket colleagues, was called “The Drive”. Trevor first played for the Westcliff club at the age of 14 and resumed his playing days there after his retirement from first-class cricket. As a boy, he had watched Harold Larwood and Hedley Verity bowl against Essex at the Chalkwell Park ground. It was so pleasant, he said, to be able to walk or cycle there, to and from home, or to hit tennis balls for his boon companion and favourite dog, Scruffy, to retrieve from the further reaches of the park. There was a tumble of reminiscences, as they revisited their glorious yesterdays, in one of the last reunions between Trevor and fellow veteran Test campaigners. The occasion was his 80th birthday celebration, one of a series of gatherings in London and at home in Westcliff. Trevor had succeeded Denis Compton as president of the Cricketers’ Club and the glasses were raised to him at this convivial meeting. Fred Trueman could be seen, hunched in earnest conversation with the Bedser twins, in one corner of the lounge. Tom Graveney and Reg Simpson, the batting stylists, were linked again on the card of guests. Talking to one and all, often at the same time, was Godfrey Evans, the master of merry-making ceremonies. It was said of “Godders”, the staggeringly athletic wicketkeeper in his heyday, that he was the best of his kind. Standing up to the vicious leg-cutters of Alec Bedser was a testimony to his greatness.
§
The measure of Trevor Bailey’s cricket apprenticeship and later eminence with Essex and England has been gleaned from a veritable army of collaborators. First and foremost has been the rich wisdom of Doug Insole, a close friend since their days at Cambridge University and later a Test and county colleague. I thank him, most sincerely, for contributing the foreword to my book. I am also much indebted to John Wilcox, the son of Denys Wilcox, for his generous and unstinting support in recalling the early days at Alleyn Court. For a private view of the Bailey family, I am deeply appreciative to them for the use of many previously unpublished photographs. I must also acknowledge the assistance and guidance given by Mrs CM Lucy, Keeper of the Archives, and senior fellow Terry Walsh in my researches at the Dulwich College library in recalling the exploits of one of the college’s most esteemed sportsmen. Jo Miller, at the Surrey CCC library, has been unfailingly helpful in providing photocopies of magazine reports. In Essex, Ken Preston, Keith Fletcher and Robin Hobbs have respectively contributed their own yield of memories. At the Essex county headquarters at Chelmsford, archivist Tony Debenham has given me the opportunity to examine the yearbooks covering Bailey’s career and additionally given me access to his own book on classic Essex matches, which highlight many of Bailey’s astounding all-round performances for the count