Stumpies and me

 

Sad to see today that Rodney Marsh, the great old wicketkeeper of Australia's wonderful 1970s and early 80s cricket team, has died at 74.  He was a hero of my youth, when I discovered and started playing this wonderful old English institution, and that team was one of the finest ever to play the game I came to love and still miss playing (although the love has turned to apathy....)

I remember when they came to England for an Ashes tour in the early 70s - I can't remember the exact year - boasting one of the best fast bowling attacks in history in Dennis Lillee and Jeff Thompson.  They were both incredibly quick and agrressive bowlers, with beautiful smooth actions: from long run-ups they would pound in and still be accelerating as they hit their delivery stride.  Able to move the ball either way off the seam and with brutal bouncers (in the days before helmets and chest protectors) they were a fearsome proposition for even the best batsmen.  Behind the stumps stood Marshy, cap pulled down low over his eyes, moustache bristling aggressively as he "chatted" to the batsman.  The Daily Mirror, on the eve of the First Test, gave over its back page to a picture of him, holding his hands out towards the camera, every finger taped around the joints, a broad grin on his face.  It was captioned "The Man Who Catches Bombs" - in reference to the wicked pace the hard ball would come through to him from Lillee and Thommo.

And catch them he did - "caught Marsh bowled Lillee" was a cricketing catch phrase for years as he built up a then record 365 dismissals in 96 Test matches between 1970 and 1984.  Not all from Lillee and Thompson of course - but a good many were (95 of them off Lillee alone).  He was a decent batsman too, becoming the first Aussie wicketkeeper to score a century in a Test match, typically in the 1977 Centenary Test against England.  

Over the period of his career, the only other 'keepers to match his ability were England pair Alan Knott and Bob Taylor, and I loved watching them all.  The 70s were halcyon days for cricket lovers, and I have vivid memories of taking lunch at 12 when there was a Test series (especially against the Aussies or the fearsome West Indies) and running next door to the Swan Hotel.  It had a small room off the bar with a tv and half a dozen overstuffed armchairs, and I would sit there until the cricket lunchbreak at 1:30 watching the match, before returning to work.  Then I would dash back at 5, when work finished, and settle down to watch the last couple of hours' play.  A couple of colleagues, Bob Newmarch and Peter Thickpenny (I wonder whatever happened to them?) would invariably get there first and nab the best two armchairs, but it didn't matter.

And Marshy and Knotty and BT would be my focus.

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I started playing cricket when I was 16.  A neighbour of ours, old Maurice Bentley, was a retired local player and acted as groundsman for the smaller of the two clubs in the town where I grew up.  He also acted as umpire every weekend and had a son, maybe 10 years older than me, named Colin, who was in the RAF but played most weekends - he was a decent fast bowler and middle order batsman.  They persuaded me to play one weekend, when they were short, lent me some boots and flannels and I had a go.  I really enjoyed it, so said I'd play again next time they were short - which turned out to be the next week.  I wasn't much good then, but young and keen, and found myself playing pretty much every weekend for the next four years.  I even bought my own whites and boots.   

The club tried me in different fielding positions, and helped m improve my batting and bowling with advice (I wouldn't call it coaching) from Colin and some of the older players.  I ended up opening the batting and bowling a bit (left arm medium pace swing), and fielding either at square leg or silly mid on - close in front of the bat and a tad dangerous - and I enjoyed it.  We had a "Single Wicket" competition every year, a knock-out where you competed against another player, both having three overs (or perhaps four, depending on how many were competing) to score as many runs as possible and get your opponent out.  It was great fun, and in my last year with the club I managed to win the thing, much to everyone's surprise (not least my own!) on the strength of my bowling.  The only person who gave me any chance was Colin Bentley: he acted as a bookmaker for the day (we all chipped in a quid on our favoured winner) and he placed his money on me to win it - he bought me a couple of beers from his winnings in the King & Queen (our club pub).  Great day.

Regretfully, the club folded soon after that.  Players drifted away, or in the case of some of the older ones retired, and it became increasingly hard to field a team.  Matters came to a head when for a home match we only had 7 players turn up, with me as captain.  I won the otss, elected to bat, asked the opposition skipper to go easy on us, then jumped on my bike and charged off around the town trying to find kids prepared to come and make up the numbers.  I found 2, so the opposition lent us one of theirs and we played 10-a-side.  We were slaughtered.  On the Monday we had a committee meeting (it was my only year on that) and reluctantly decided there was no point in going on, and folded the club.  We spent an hour the following evening going through the kitbag, and I snagged a pair of pads and batting gloves (I'd already bought my own bat) and, crucially, a strong protective box for my nuts.....

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I went to play for the Town cricket club after that, and spent a happy five years there until I got married and gave up playing - my missus had more important things for us to do. I've regretted ever since stopping playing so young (I was only 25...) with years unrealized.  My batting had improved, I could still bowl a decent spell (in my last season I topped the bowling averages for the season despite only playing half of it) and started wicketkeeping.  I did that principally to help my football, still my main sport - I was goalkeeping for my club's first XI at a decent standard, and I figured keeping wicket during the summer would keep me fit and agile for the football season....which it did. 

And I modelled my play on Rodney Marsh.  I already had the face fungus, though not so bushy as his, and the longish hair - as did everyone in those days! - so pulling my cap down low and bending the peak gave a passing resemblance I guess.  I copied his squat before delivery, the way he moved to follow the ball's trajectory, and the loud catch appeal, hand held high still holding the ball rather than tossing it high in the air as most players did.  Then someone bought me a floppy sun hat, so I started wearing that, the brim turned up front and back like Bob Taylor wore his.  He was lighter on his feet than Marshy, and more wiry in stature, and had quick hands: possibly the best keeper standing up to the wicket other than Knotty I've ever seen.

I did ok.  Not too many stumpings or catches standing up, but back a bit I was fine, and bagged loads of catches.  I got 7 in one match and conceded no extras (easily my best day), and had to buy a jug of ale in the bar afterwards to share with everyone.  It was good night: someone else bought one for bagging 5 wickets, as did one of their players, and another of their guys bought one for scoring a fifty.  The card session afterwards was fun too, I won about a tenner at three-card brag.  They were happy times.

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Those were probably cricket's best years, at least in my opinion.  The county game was still strong with good crowds and televised all season.  There was a Sunday league competition, 50 overs each side, that was also televised.  Internationsal players, the best in the business - Ian Botham, David Gower, Bob Willis, Bob Taylor et al - were not on central contracts and turned out for their counties between Tests: as much as anything, that was great for a player out of form at international level to play his way back in.  

Then Kerry Packer came along and bought all the top players for his "Circus", thus getting them banned by the ICC and ushering in commercialism.  The Circus didn't last all that long, the players drifted back to the county and international arena, but the damage was done: they wanted to be rewarded in the same way as Packer had rewarded them, so sponsorship came in, then more County matches, new short form games, more Test matches, and the game was on a slippery slope.  Now we have some ludicrous competetions like the Big Bash or the Hundred (or whatever it's called), lasting 10 or 20 overs, that are just batsmen trying to tonk the ball out of the ground.....  We used to call them "beer matches", and played them if the proper game was over by tea-time: batting oarder reversed, everyone bowling an over or two (depending on available time), just for a laught, losers buy the beer.  Now it's an international game with floodlit evening matches and players in coloured kit with their names on their backs and sponsor's logos all over the place.

I can't take it seriously, I'm afraid.  I recognise hardly any of today's international "superstars" - not one of them can hold a candle to the likes of Botham and Gower, Inran Khan or Viv Richards - or for that matter Marshy.  It's all very sad......but then progress often is, at least to us old 'uns.

Anyway, rest in peace, Marshy, ,and thanks for the memories,  There'll never be another like you.  

And I can think of no higher praise than that.