Cricket nostalgia

[Wowbagger]

I do like it when an article appears celebrating yesteryear's deeds of derring-do.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/oct/19/curtly-ambrose-england-west-indies-cricket-supreme-bowling-100-great-test-performances

[benborp]

I take it you read the article on Duncan Spencer last month:
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/the-nightwatchman/2016/sep/16/duncan-spencer-cricket-fast-bowler

There's been a nice run of articles recently.

[Tewdric]

While we're on the subject I will never forget listening to this on the car radio as a teenager.

https://youtu.be/zZzWcfg4_sc

[Jaded]

I was off sick. A once in five years experience. I watched it in black and white on a tiny TV screen. A once in a lifetime experience.

[Peter]

I take it you read the article on Duncan Spencer last month:
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/the-nightwatchman/2016/sep/16/duncan-spencer-cricket-fast-bowler

There's been a nice run of articles recently.

Thanks very much for that.  I love my cricket but I'd never even heard of him.  Wish now I'd seen him "live".  The clip is also a reminder of how bad some of the pajamas were!

[Von Broad]

I take it you read the article on Duncan Spencer last month:
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/the-nightwatchman/2016/sep/16/duncan-spencer-cricket-fast-bowler

What a fascinating article.
I'm struggling to remember the guy.
And Dennis Lillee described him as 'frightening'.
Crikey!

It's the same in all sports though, to be first class is amazing in itself, but to play with any kind of consistency at the highest level is something else again.

It never ceases to amuse me how cricket has this gentlemanly, fair play, kind of image, and yet I've always though that to be out there in the middle, bat in hand, facing a pumped up fast bowler, smelling blood, just about to launch something at you that, apart from barely being able to see it at all, if you don't see it, it could easily kill you....is probably one of the most terrifying places to be in the whole of  sport.

[Wowbagger]

I take it you read the article on Duncan Spencer last month:
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/the-nightwatchman/2016/sep/16/duncan-spencer-cricket-fast-bowler

There's been a nice run of articles recently.

No, I hadn't seen that, and I had never heard of Duncan Spencer! Amazing stuff. It sort of reminds me of the Spedegue's Dropper story, which frustratingly seems to be one of the few Conan Doyle works not available online.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Very interesting article. Particularly his comments on how lack of strength training and not using things like ice baths led to a shortening of his career. He really wishes he'd done weight training and ice baths had been around when he was in his early 20s.

[Jock Stewart]

I've just finished reading the Duncan Spencer article. Absolutely brilliant. Loved it.

Well written - brought the characters to life, made the apparent mundaness of the county circuit not mundane, and shows how much better England still need to be in their coaching procedure in bringing through raw talent.

[bobb]

What a wonderful article!

A great video too. Notice how Sir Isaac Vivian Alexander Richards didn't even bother with a magic hat, even against someone as ferocious as Spencer.

I vaguely remember Spencer (although not by name) as I was in Australia when he got busted for nandrolone - it was all over the papers at the time....

[robgul]

While we're on the subject I will never forget listening to this on the car radio as a teenager.

https://youtu.be/zZzWcfg4_sc

I was in Leeds that afternoon driving a truck delivering some printing machinery to a shop we were opening - absolutely no traffic or people around - all listening/watching what was happening up the road at Headingly.

[Interestingly, years later IF everyone that said they were there really had been there then Headingly would have had a spectator capacity larger than Wembley!]

Rob

[pcolbeck]

I watched this at my Grandmas house live with my Uncle who emigrated to Canada in the late 60s but was back for a visit. One of my all time great sporting memories for several reasons.

https://youtu.be/oG7oRGEh9KM

[bobb]

I've watched that many times over the years

A couple of things of note: For all the wild slogs Botham played, he also had some beautiful, text book strokes. And he hit the ball hard. Very, very hard 

[Mr Larrington]

Some of my skool chums were there, holding a banner reading "Bob Willis strikes more than British Leyland"

[Wowbagger]

Here's a bit of resurrection!

I was nattering to My Good Pal Penelope this afternoon, over half a gallon or so of tea. We were discussing literature of all kinds and sports writing cropped up. I mentioned The Story of Spedegue's Dropper and I have now found a link online. It was first published in 1928, only two years before Conan Doyle's death, and is a curious portent of the Bodyline series, which occurred 5 years after the story was published.

https://www.arthur-conan-doyle.com/index.php?title=The_Story_of_Spedegue%27s_Dropper#The_Story_of_Spedegue.27s_Dropper